Courage; Fear Made Known

My last posting about fear seemed to resonate with many. Since every yin has yang and every up has down, I want to share, expound, pontificate – whatever I do – about my beliefs on courage. Courage isn’t a word we hear much anymore unless it’s attributed to heroic rescues, but, exhibiting courage is dealing with our fears, all fears - big or small; that is courage – always.

I read two quotations recently: “Courage is standing up for your beliefs when others remain seated,” and “Courage is listening and remaining silent in the face of contrary opinions.” Obviously, thoughts penned by people of very different temperaments and different ideas of courage. Courage may manifest by standing, staying seated or a variety of ways - it depends on personal fortitude. Courage may be exhibited in a loud and obtrusive manner, but it may also enter timidly and masquerade as every day behavior.

FIRST:

We can’t exhibit bravery without first experiencing fear.

A person may be labeled as courageous, but unless fear was part of the equation, that person may have accomplished great things, but they did not exhibit courage. Courage denotes overcoming the terror that shrieks, “I can’t!” and then behaviorally, we do. We persist in moving forward in spite of being frightened.

Any forward momentum in the face of fear is courage.

I want to repeat that…

Any forward momentum in the face of fear is courage.

Let’s all celebrate our victories of courage instead of beating ourselves up for the times, metaphorically, that we cower in the corner and can’t take one more step.

Let’s celebrate the computer-nerd father who gets out in the yard with his children, when he doesn’t know a fast ball from a snowball, and risks feeling and looking foolish; the introvert who takes a job interacting with the public and expends tremendous energy learning extroverted behaviors and returns day after day to the job that drains their inner-resources; the mother who admits she needs a break from a new infant – and asks for help; or the depressed person who gets up and functions, instead of sleeping to escape those thoughts that make them suffer.

THESE are some examples of courage.

SECOND:
Candidly, there may be times when all we can do is put the covers over our heads and refuse to go one step further until we recoup. Demonstrating courage takes an inordinate amount of energy. When our wells run dry, we have to tap into our higher-selves through rest and meditation and regain energy to begin again. There really are scary things out there that distract us from goals – whether anyone else acknowledges they’re scary or not. No one else has to understand our fear for it to be real – to us.

Growing up, I was much more introverted than other family members. Once a passel of relatives came to visit from another state and stayed at our house. Getting to know these people, who were strangers to me, drained me. I kept going outside, hiding in our motor home, until I could recoup my energy to be conversational again. In retrospect, I guess my fear was of being judged as not being lovable because I wasn’t charming enough, conversational enough, yada, yada, yada…

But, uh-oh! My mother, the extrovert, came looking for me. (I can hear the da, da, da, da, da, da, of the Wicked Witch of the West song now.) The motor home door flew open. My mother stood there; eyes blazing and said, “What do you think you’re doing? You have company to entah – taaaane.” (Her southern accent came back when she was about to use all three of my names.) “Tawnee Vivian Isbell, you need to get back into that hauhse riiiiiiiight nouw.”

I muttered, “I feel scared.”

In a way only a mother could, she - said, “WHAT”S wrrrooooooooooonnnnnnnnnggggggggg with yyyyyyyyooooooouuuuuuuuuuuu? (Encroaching on Belle-ism.) That is your faaahhhhmahllleeeee, in theahr. Your fahmahlee.” She stomped back into the house and yelled over her shoulder, “You are so strange.”

She, being an extrovert off the scale, didn’t understand. Leaving and going back in – for me - took courage. If you’re an extrovert reading this, I’m sure you’re totally flummoxed (I love that word, it almost sounds obscene, but isn’t in the least) and without a personal point of reference, you may believe my mother was right – I AM STRANGE. Ah, and there’s the rub.

Does another have to recognize an act as being courageous before it IS a courageous act?

Of course, the answer is no. It’s the same premise as no one having to understand our fear for it to be real and to be part of our make-up. If I go to the gym, am afraid to go (too awkward, too fat, too whatever), yet go anyway, I have no witnesses, but I have still acted courageously.

THIRD:
In most religious beliefs there is a statement about accepting the truth and you will be set free. This tenet applies also to our fear. If we choose to deny we have fear, then it will continue to control our behaviors. Only when we acknowledge our fear, accept the truth of it (because it is what it is, denying it will not eliminate it) and choose to behave in graceful ways that move us gently forward, will we be able to transcend the feelings and make friends with our fears.

There is a book called, Loving What Is, by Byron Katie, the reading of which has nearly dissipated the mental quagmire that has kept me paralyzed through much of my life. She poses four questions to ask ourselves when thoughts begin to cause us to suffer (and if you have fear you have labeled as irrational, then you suffer):

Is it true?
Is it really true – how do you know it’s true?
How do you feel when you believe that’s true?
How would your life be different if you didn’t believe that were true?

Then she advocates something called a turnaround, which is complicated, but you can view by going to You Tube and searching for Byron Katie - or by clicking on the video, I've added at the end of this posting...

Inculcating her recommendations, which she calls, “The Work,” has been life-altering for me. I now have a process with which to dissolve the fears that have kept me a prisoner. By bringing rational thought to my unconscious fears, I’ve realized it’s been my ego ramrodding my behavior: the fear of rejection, fear of feeling foolish, fear of looking foolish, fear that I’m not loved, fear of getting hurt, fear of not doing something perfectly - fear, fear, fear, fear - irrational, immobilizing, paralyzing - fear.

FOURTH:
However, let me also say that some fears are ABSOLUTELY VALID and are radar for our safety. Another excellent book called, The Gift of Fear, written by Gavin DeBecker, helps us process our perceptions and intuition when someone or something may mean us harm, and to act upon them, so that we may stay safe. We ignore these signals at our own peril. If we believe it is unwise to get into an elevator with a stranger, regardless of how it may be perceived by the stranger or by others, don’t get in. Those hairs that stand up on the back of our necks and that feeling we have in the pit of our stomachs have scientific explanations, but the short answer is they are warnings.

Those fears protect us; our conjured fears inhibit our growth.

As the youngest child on the block, I eavesdropped on the monster-movie conversations of the big girls without understanding that monsters weren’t real. Don’t even get me started on Dracula and the deed he held on my sleepless nights or the tears I cried over the possibility that my parents would become werewolves. I expended a lot of energy warding off goblins of my own conjuring.

My mom used to say that I borrowed more trouble than anyone she’d ever known. Mark Twain said it another way: “I’ve experienced many troubles in my life, and some of them actually happened.”

FINALLY:
Courage is what keeps us going. Courage props us up to try again and again and again until we accept that we have fear and welcome it into the light. We can then begin to live more peaceful lives - without the need for so much courage.

Choices and Fear

I’ve recently been seeking additional streams of income. (Translation: Job – I feel my skin crawling and my stomach churning as I put that word into print. That word is so jarring to this artist’s sense of freedom, just writing it causes palpitations.) As a result, I came across a new type of art therapy (yeah! feeling calmer) that referred me to a page in Facebook for more information. To view the site, I had to register with Facebook and become a member.

What a new world!

Pictures and moment-by-moment happenings and links to web site and blogs – woo hoo, what a place!

After registering and adding my information, I began to hear from people I hadn’t heard from in years – including the boy who lived next door to me all my growing up years. He was Tag, to my Annie Oakley; Tonto to my Lone Range; “it” during hide and go seek! (Yes, I was a bit of a bully – although I just thought I had better ideas for fun - and ALWAYS got to be who I wanted to be. Sorry, Richard. I’m better now that I’ve had therapy…)

Additionally, with Facebook there is an ease of correspondence. Unless you send something privately, everyone who has listed you as a friend can see what’s been written. So, a comment I make to my friend in Colorado may prompt conversation from a friend in Texas and so forth. I always thought Facebook was a tool used only by young cruisers, but am pleased to discover it’s a marketing tool for one’s business, as well as a social network for increasing ones’ contact with the outside world. You know we artist types, the lone wolves, get lonely from time to time and want company - when we want it, by golly, and with Facebook there is almost always something new posted.

Very Cool.

So, if you are registered with Facebook, you’ve probably received the circulating request that tells you to post twenty-five random things about yourself and then to send it to twenty-five other friends for their input and before you know it, it’s gone around the Universe twice and is making a third rotation. HUGE stuff! It spreads like the proverbial wildfire or – middle-aged abdominal roll – whichever resonates with you – but it goes FAST.

A good friend of mine sent me the request, so I promptly got on the computer, wrote my list and complied further by forwarding the request on to my friends – although I didn’t have twenty-five friends registered at the time, I sent it to those I had. Now that I think about it, no one from my list has answered my request – uh-oh – bottlenecks! You all get busy so our community can be better informed about one another. All right, I know, I know, you’re busy and I work from home. GOT IT!

Regardless, it was a fun exercise. It’s interesting what comes up when one sits down and begins to ponder what twenty-five random things denote life’s memorable moments. Here’s my list –

1. I am the youngest of seven children. My father and mother married with two children each; Daddy had boys, Momma had girls then they had two together. They had children in the public school system from 1938 – 1971, when I graduated from high school. No wonder they were tired by the time I was born, that, and the fact that they were 40 years old at my birth!

2. My twenty-two year old daughter, Bree, graduated from Middle Tennessee State University in May with a BS in business. She works as an assistant media buyer at a large advertising agency in Nashville. She attended the 2008 CMA awards, sat on the main level with the stars and has met Reba McIntire. She’s having a fun life! Additionally, she’s a kind and loving person. I’m very proud of her.

3. I have hiked the Grand Canyon and soared 2,000 feet above the Sonoma Valley in a glider.

4. I have a black-rescued cat, Starlette, whom I love and adore. She is an angel kitty. She didn’t leave my side while I recuperated from surgery following a ruptured cervical disc.

5. Although my parents had life-long ethnic bias, our family gatherings were similar to small United Nations groups. One sister married a German national and had children with skin as fair as to seem nearly translucent. Another sister married a Mexican-American and had children with beautiful brown eyes and smooth, brown skin. My eldest sister’s third husband (fifth marriage) was Native American, and although they didn’t have children together, he had a daughter who was welcomed into the fold. Additionally, Aunt Dorothy adopted two Japanese orphans when she and her Air Force husband were stationed in the Pacific country following WWII.

6. When I worked as a sales rep at an Arizona hotel, John Wayne spent the night at our property. I met him, gave him my morning paper as the gift shop was sold out, and shook his hand. He was a very kind man. I’ve been in the energy of THE DUKE!

7. Speaking of those I’ve met, I grew up in Independence, Missouri less than a mile from Harry S Truman, one of my heroes. I’ve written a screenplay about his life as a young man and his life-long love of Bess Wallace, the woman he married. I have put out to the universe that I want Gary Ross, who directed Seabiscuit, to produce and direct the movie. GARY ROSS WHERE ARE YOU – HARRY CALLS!

8. Depression plagues my family of origin. When I began taking Effexor XR for menopause symptoms, I awakened for the first time in my life without sadness. Since I had nothing with which to compare my prior mental state, I didn’t realize that I had endured low-level depression my whole life - until I didn’t any longer. I believe my family is genetically pre-disposed to low Serotonin levels, which explains many of the shenanigans I endured as a child…

9. My father, mother, sister, brother, aunt and three uncles have died of cancer.

10. I was diagnosed and received treatment for cancer in 2007. I am eager for adventure and travel knowing – emotionally as well as mentally – that our time is finite.

11. I am of Greek, French, Irish and Native-American ancestry.

12. I am on a life-long learning quest; I am a bibliophile.

13. Bob and I had our second wedding anniversary flying over the Atlantic. We were headed to Romania to help with needs of some of the 500,000 orphans and abandoned babies who reside there. We’ve also been to Austria, France, Germany, Belgium, Luxembourg and England for fun. I hope to go to Greece next and find relatives!

14. One of my most breathtaking moments was the first time I saw a Great Blue Heron take flight.

15. My best friend growing up was my nephew, Lonny, who was three months younger than I. During the 1980s, and many years of internal torment, he chose sexual reassignment surgery, and became my niece. I am writing a memoir about our lives, together, and also of our separate paths.

16. As a child, I wanted to be a singer, an actress or an archeologist for my life’s work. I have done a fair amount of singing, although I’ve always been so terrified I wouldn’t perform perfectly, it’s been very sporadic. The acting thing worked itself out through my introverted self attempting to portray an extrovert – very painfully at times. And the archeology – well, there was that one man I married…but, surely that wasn’t it. THAT must still be ahead of me!

17. I feel fortunate to still be friends with high school buddies.

18. I am passionate about animals and seek to have encounters whenever possible. I have had physical contact - held & loved on – innumerable dogs and cats, as well as Bengal Tiger cubs, a leopard cub, a full-grown cheetah, a Kinkajou, a tiny, baby Coati Mondi, a Cockatoo, giraffe, rhino, wolves and an Asian brown bear. I want to love on a lemur next. When I was in Costa Rica I began talking to a wild Three-toed Sloth in the treetops of the rain forest. He stopped munching, turned his body to see me on the ground and climbed down the tree, as if to come and visit. I became a bit frightened; stopped talking to him and pulled my energy in. He quit his descent, hung by his back claws, looked me in the eye and patted his hands together – almost as if he were applauding. If I hadn’t had witnesses, I’d have thought I’d inhaled too much noxious gas from Mt. Arenal and as a result was hallucinating. Amazing encounters!

19. I was a safety-patrol crossing guard when I was eleven.

20. Studying with Lynne Forrest changed my life forever. (www.lynneforrest.com) She introduced me to Core Beliefs, as well as to Eckert Tolle and Byron Katie. I no longer suffer from self-loathing and self-destructive behaviors - or rarely do - anymore.

21. White cats have been present at most major junctures in my life. I don’t know what it means; it’s an observation.

22. I love elephants; according to Ted Andrews, the author of Animal Speak, they are my totem animal.

23. I have vertigo and feel ill when looking down from high places. However, I climbed a 30-foot telephone pole to participate in a ropes course. I wouldn’t do it again. I just didn’t want to be controlled by fear.

24. Mamma Mia is my favorite movie of all time and I LOVE movies! It is too fun; music, dancing, amazingly beautiful GREEK scenery, Meryl Streep’s acting! What’s not to like?

25. In high school, I was voted the craziest girl by my classmates of 400. (What do you think?)

Although, these items denote twenty-five times I’ve embraced life, there are more times than I care to remember when fear has stopped me in my tracks. Three in particular come to mind:

When I was very young, my parents would take me and my sister to dinner at a restaurant located at a near-by lake. Each time we drove the few miles to the lake, we’d pass a field that was flat and was the color of the crayon Spring Green, from the Crayola box. There was no air conditioning in vehicles yet and when we rolled by the field, it always smelled fresh and cool. I would say aloud how I yearned to run through the field. One day, my mom pulled the car onto the shoulder of the road, told me to go ahead and run through it and she’d wait for me.

I was gripped by uncertainty and fear and cowered in the back seat. She put the car in gear and drove on.

As I had time to reflect, I told her that I would get out and I asked her to stop again, but she never did. Looking back, the field was probably someone’s crop of spring wheat or some other green produce and it was good I didn’t trample it. But, I’ve always regretted not jumping out of the car and having the mud squish through my toes as I ran with abandon in that glowing green field.

Then, when I was in my twenties and living in California, a man heard me sing and offered to finance my next career move. He told me about investors he worked with and that it would be strictly a business arrangement, and by-the-way, “he had been one of the first to have heard Linda Ronstadt at the Troubadour Club and recognized HER talent.” Those were days before the Internet or music videos, what was I going to do promote my career? I’d always worked in an office and sang, very rarely, on the side.

I toyed with the idea, but had no idea what to do with the $50,000 he offered me. I said thanks, but no thanks. All of my life all I’d ever wanted to do was sing – and yet, fear kept me from moving forward. I told someone who believed in my gift that I wasn’t interested and continued to work in an OFFICE! Oh, my. Now, was he on the up and up? Did he have an ulterior motive? I will never know because I refused his offer.

And, my life took a very different path – actually – not a different path than it was on – it was on the path of offices and frustration. The fork was presented to me and I chose safety.

The third scenario was just as regretful.

A physician, who lives in a near-by town, began working in animal rescue. Bob and I were at his compound visiting with him, as he worked shoring up an enclosure which housed three adult tigers and seemed to be made of residential fencing. As we spoke, a juvenile lion in the next enclosure, ran in circles clamoring for attention. Since Bob and I had just volunteered to help in his efforts, he asked me if I would come on a weekly basis and help socialize the lion. It would involve being in the cage, talking to the lion, petting him and generally helping him accept humans as friends.

I was so excited! I couldn’t wait to begin! A lion – and a male lion, at that, mane and all! Although this little fellow still had his camouflage spots he would grow into the mighty King of the Beasts and I would be his companion!

And, I wasn’t afraid: Not one whit – not one - until I questioned why I wasn’t afraid of one of the most powerful carnivores in the world. Okay, and get this, then I was afraid that I wasn’t afraid…

Huh?

I was afraid that my lack of fear would cause me to do careless things like turning my back on him or dropping my guard while playing and I would be mauled by him. I envisioned having slash marks and trying to untangle myself from his mighty claws. I refused the opportunity. I refused an opportunity to be in the energy of one of the most beautiful and noble animals in the world. I truly wimped out.

A couple of years later, I was back at the compound, when I had my Kinkajou encounter, the pictures of which I've added above. I went to see my lion. His mane was not completely full, but had grown in and he sat on the second floor of his enclosure looking sad (anthropomorphizing, I know) and very alone. Lions live in prides with many other lions, whereas tigers are solitary animals. It seemed ironic that the tigers had roommates, but Leo was doomed to solitary.

As I looked at him, the wind ruffled his mane and he stared at me as I stared back. Until my dying day, I will regret that fear kept me from nurturing that magnificent creature.

I said all of that to say this: Sometimes there really IS only one chance to run barefoot in the field or to have a singing career or to love on a lion.

The fear that prevents us from following our hearts is our ego running rampant. Our egos long to keep us caged and controlled. Sometimes the fear isn’t even tangible; fear of what? Sometimes it’s only of looking foolish. Sometimes, it’s fear of being another’s lunch. But, most of the time it’s just fear, free-floating, paralyzing, “I’m not going to do that,” fear.

I strive daily to manage my fear – not to conquer it. I believe the more we deny our fear the more it possesses us. The more I deny that fear courses through my body, the more fearful I become, then I become agitated, then I become downright hateful – because the person I hate at that time is me - me, being controlled by my fear.

I now accept my fear almost as a mother embraces a crying child. I question it: “What’s the worst that can happen to me?” or “How will accepting this opportunity enhance or detract from my life’s journey?” I am gentle with myself as I accept my foibles and shortcomings. I no longer believe I have to appear perfect for people to love me.

My spiritual teachers tell me that there are no accidents and that life unfolds as it will. I say I believe it, but then again, I wonder how different life would be today if I’d run through that field, believed in my talent as much as a stranger believed in me or taken a once in a lifetime opportunity to socialize a lion.

Groundhog's Day and Other Celebrations

Today is February second, Groundhog’s Day, the supposed predictor of the next six weeks’ weather. It’s also Sandra Wilson’s birthday.

When I was growing-up, Sandra Wilson lived around the corner. Each day for school, she wore a brown headband with blue stars and moons and she had the whitest teeth I’d ever seen. She also wrote with a green-striped fountain pen that flowed peacock-colored ink. She was two years my senior. I thought she was a goddess.

Sandra moved away when I was nine. I haven’t seen or heard from her since her mother’s car pulled away from the curb. But, every February second she pops into my mind, and I think, "Today is Sandra Wilson’s birthday. I wonder where she is."

The older I get, the more important it becomes to ponder the influence people have had in my life and to reach back to embrace them. As the guardian angel Clarence proclaims to George Bailey in the movie, It’s a Wonderful Life, “All of our lives touch each other’s lives and when you’re not there, it leaves a terrible hole.” Lives intertwine and destiny changes; no encounter is exempt.

In 1953, my parents bought a house. Daddy had experienced a terrible fall at his place of employment and following the surgery, his settlement money gave him the down payment to make the purchase. It was the first house he or my mother had ever owned. There was a two room apartment in the front of the house which would help make the $50 monthly mortgage payment they owed to Mr. Snodgrass, the former owner, who'd financed it himself. Mr. and Mrs. Mock resided in the front apartment. They were our tenants.

Mr. Mock drove a taxi and Mrs. Mock wore a floral apron and raised robins. When I was barely old enough to walk, she and I would go to a nearby stream and dig worms for her birds. When we returned with our wiggling victims, I’d sit in the sunny bay window and watch as she fed the hungry yellow bobbing mouths, each competing for its share of the nourishment. She helped potty train me and would allow me to crawl into bed with them in the mornings, and listen while Mr. Mock read the funny papers aloud. They moved away when I was three. I never saw them again.

At this stage of my life, as my own daughter is raised and living in a near-by city, I have more time to think. And, for whatever reason, Mr. and Mrs. Mock have come roaring back into my mind. I wish I knew how to get in touch with their children to hear stories about the lives of these two who helped raise me and that I loved.

I always fantasized that I’d run into Steve, my first serious boyfriend - meaning he kissed me instead of just holding my hand - somewhere, maybe at the supermarket by the celery or frozen food, or perhaps at a restaurant as I’d swoop by looking chic, slender and amazingly desirable. He resembled Brad Pitt, with similar luscious, generous lips and drove a red sports car in which he picked me up every morning for class and drove me home each afternoon. We dated until he went away to Vietnam. He served in the infantry.

He came back to our hometown, remote, and addicted to drugs. In my very prim and proper manner, I would not be involved with anyone addicted to drugs, so I went out with others, even as he sat in my living room watching television with my sister. He had a short courtship with another woman and married her. I moved to another city.

He died a couple of years ago. I hadn’t seen him since I was eighteen.

At his visitation, as my sister looked at the photographs displayed of his life, she picked one up of him and me, taken in 1967, at the Missouri State Fair. His wife walked over and said that she’d discovered the picture in his wallet and didn’t know who the woman was with Steve. I am saddened that for forty-years I yearned to see him by the celery and he carried me in his wallet – two old friends who never made peace with our life’s divergence.

People come into our lives to teach us lessons.

I used to think that people were interchangeable and if I became disenchanted with the behaviors of my friends, I could merely look for someone else with whom to spend my time. My life lesson is that individuals are not replaceable. Individuals’ spirits casts their own glow about us that another’s will not. We are forever changed by our encounters – all of our encounters – not just the dramatic ones, but all of them.

I didn’t learn this lesson in time to tell Steve that I was sorry for my hubris, or to hug Mr. and Mrs. Mock again or to tell them that I loved them, but I’m going to Google Sandra Wilson and call her every February second, tell her I thought she was a goddess, and wish her a happy birthday.