BornWilder

Author. Certified Coach. Catalytic Speaker

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On Optimism

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balloons held to a door with crepe paper

A recent Washington Post headline, “Time to ditch ‘toxic positivity,’ experts say: ‘It’s okay not to be okay,'” made me question whether I have answered too many pandemic texts with an “always look on the bright side of life” attitude.

The answer: probably.

I have a history of optimism. For example, when I was twenty, a co-worker said she couldn’t hang out with me because I was too optimistic for her. I have no idea what we were talking about, or what I said that prompted her statement. The point is, our conversation happened while I was at my lowest, only months after the car crash I was responsible for. Where was this optimism coming from?

One study says 25% of people are born optimistic. Maybe I’m one of the 25%. Perhaps, innate optimism put my feet on the floor when I didn’t want to face the day. My genes kept me searching for a solution to shame and self-hatred while I believed my feelings were deserved.

I’m okay that I’m not okay

As an optimist, there is one thing I know: it’s okay not to be okay.

Not being okay in my twenties helped me define what I wanted out of this life; it provided opportunities to tap into strengths I never knew possible. Wait. I just turned “not okay” into a positive. Is that optimistic?

Let me try again.

I believe in sitting underneath a blanket on the couch, and looking “not okay” in the eyes. I believe in learning every nook and cranny of painful emotions. In asking, Where does my pain originate from? How did I get here, to this place that is so heavy and hurtful?

Why do I believe in addressing pain this way? Because going through emotional hardship is what helped me move through it. If it wasn’t for facing what made me not okay, I wouldn’t be sitting here on this rainy Thursday morning searching for ways to connect with you. I wouldn’t feel worthy.

If I hadn’t brought “not okay” into my fold, and made it part of who I am instead of something I didn’t want in my life, I wouldn’t have found the path to contentment. And I really like feeling at peace with myself. Embracing my pain gave me the power to let it go.

Hardship from the pandemic is not over. Far from it. When I receive a distressed text or call from a loved one, I’ll be more mindful to not be “toxic positive.” But the optimism stays. I will continue to remind others to breathe, take a nap, cry all afternoon if necessary. After all, accepting “not okay” is the optimistic thing to do.

Quote and photo by author. All rights reserved.

On and On and On

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top half of footprint in sand as if child was running

As the days of 2020 melt into one another, Erykah Badu’s song “On & On” replays in my head. The song was released in 1997, the year my eldest son was born, and I hadn’t listened to it (or the album Baduizm) in a long time. Listening now, in what seems like a warped version of the movie Groundhog Day, I’m transported back into the rented brick house where I walked in circles with an infant in my arms.

I had no idea what I was doing. The matriarchs in my family lived far away, and I had no close friends who were also mothers. For perspective, I thought about all the pregnant women and new mothers throughout history. Women who trusted their bodies and instincts instead of books and Lamaze classes. They had elders too, and eventually midwives. But when I saw myself as one bead on the string of mothers throughout history, I gained a new inner strength. I believed I could be a good mother.

Around the same time, I decided to–one day–tell my story of the car crash. My goal was to influence others not to drive under the influence, or help them through the aftermath of making the same (or similar) mistake. There was a long road ahead–I had barely started the work toward healing–but I held the seed of an idea.

Seeds and Trees

I’m pretty good at not giving myself credit where credit is due. There’s many reasons for this, but one has to do with the shame I felt after the crash. While I wanted to turn my trauma into something that helped others, I equally felt I didn’t deserve any good in my life. My emotions and my intellect were at odds with one another (and would remain that way for years). So, I compromised, and threw my seed into the wind.

Twenty-three years later, in the midst of a pandemic, I watch that seed branch out in ways I never anticipated. As I sit here, my instinct is to say, “I’m glad I sent those emails last January.” The truth is: “I’m glad I decided in 1997 to one day tell my story and help others.” If I could go back in time, I would reassure my younger self to believe in the tree before she ever saw the first sprout.

My eldest son is now on his own artistic path. His younger brothers are experiencing the first remote-learning school year in history. I’m doing what I’ve been doing since 1997: juggling kids, writing, and a career. But my long ago planted seed is now a tree. And as 2020 turns toward fall, I continue my juggling act with Badu singing in the background, “The world keeps turnin’ / Oh, what a day / What a day, what a day.”

Quote and photo by author. All rights reserved.

On Process

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In April, I cut twelve poems from the poetry manuscript I planned to have finished by summer. Twelve out of sixty is a lot of poems. More than that, the poems were a thread in the book that no longer worked. Meaning, I took out a section of poems on a topic that (I once believed) helped tell the whole story.

In all honesty, I knew the poems weren’t working for a while, but I couldn’t let them go. Not because I needed the poems to be published. I wasn’t ready to dig up new poems on the subject that demanded further exploration.

By dig up, I mean: find and relive old emotions.

The manuscript went through many changes over the past ten years. I’ve been through many changes over the past ten years. Hell, the last four months.

Learning from process

To me, the writing process is like riding the ebb and flow of wave after wave. The rhythm connects all my writing: the past, present, and future. All stages of the work are connected. So when I cut something out, it never truly goes away. Leaving the twelve poems in the manuscript when I knew they didn’t belong was simply part of the revision process. Don’t get me wrong, it was tough to let them go. But it was also satisfying to make that decision and see the book grow into its final form.

I find similar satisfaction when I work in the yard. After I spent a weekend digging up those twelve poems, I went to my garage, pulled out the tiller, and dug up weeds to make a flower bed.

Often, I need physical work to mimic my mental work and the yard is a great outlet. It’s also a fun metaphor to the writing process. I plant seeds, transplant bushes, prune trees, water and mulch and weed flower beds. (Insert “words” where you see a plant reference.)

It’s July now. I wrote the twelve poems, talked with my editor, and reordered the poems in the collection. As of today, it is sent to the publisher. For the first time, these sixty poems are no longer in my possession. Soon, they belong to the world.

Now what?

It is incredibly hot outside so instead of pulling weeds I am painting my office. A present to myself for finishing the manuscript. The bookshelf is pulled away from the wall, a curtain is off its rod, the room almost three-quarters painted.

From the ebb of my completed manuscript, I am in this new present. There’s plenty to do while the book is in production. But I’m not quite ready to flow into the next phase of the writing process. For now, I paint walls. I’ll know when it’s time to move on.

Quote and photo by author. All rights reserved.

On Listening

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reflection tree in shallow river with sand and rocks

A writer has to be a good listener. Some might call us great eavesdroppers too. There’s a practice I learned from the Unitarian Universalists called ‘deep listening’. I sat in a small circle of people and when someone talked, everyone else listened and no one responded. Words floated in the room, living and breathing without input or advice or counterpoint.

It’s powerful to be deeply listened to.

It’s powerful to deeply listen to others.

I’ve been deeply listening since George Floyd’s death and want to share a few pieces that resonate with me. As I mentioned, I struggled to write this post. So many words came to mind but they didn’t know where to land. And that’s okay. I can’t always know what to say.

What I’m hearing and what it’s doing

I’m hearing Black voices in a way I never heard before, and I’m grappling with my own culpability and responsibility in systemic racism.

Personally, I’m disappointed that both my formal and social education never taught me to consider what it means to be White. While I worked to figure out my identity in my twenties, I had a lot to pull from: woman, mother, single mother, young single mother, poor, drunk driver, artist, hippy, optimist. But White was never a piece of it. That ignorance hurts. It’s shameful and it sucks to feel this way. But here I am. And it’s okay.

It’s okay because I’m in the second stage of learning (conscious incompetence) and I know that shame is an effective motivator. I’ve felt deep shame for my actions before and I changed for the better by not ignoring my shame or running away from it. I’m staying in this feeling until I work myself through it again. The best part is that this time, I’m not alone.

Where I’m listening and learning

“Running For Your Life“

A Community Poem For Ahmaud Arbery (6 minute listen)

A powerful poem woven from many voices. NPR Poet-in-residence Kwame Alexander creates one poem from the 1,000 poems that are submitted. If you read or listen to nothing else on this page, please listen to the collective voices in this six minute recording.

Van Jones on racial justice

Interview with Van Jones (5 minute listen)

News commentator and author Van Jones speaks about what the reaction to George Floyd’s death means to him.

“A letter to all struggling to understand“

Op-ed by Jason Mott

New York Times bestselling author Jason Mott offers some advice. His words have stayed with me: “These are difficult, exhausting, frightening times. I know. But don’t let that fear numb you. Don’t let it make you resentful or, worse yet, deaf and silent. We’ve all built this country. We’ve bled for it. We’ve died for it. We’re a family. Right now, a part of your family is screaming out for help. Don’t turn away from that.”

This moment cries out for us to confront race in America

Op-ed by Condoleeza Rice

Condoleeza Rice, former secretary of state from 2005 to 2009 under George W. Bush, recounts growing up in Jim Crow Alabama.

“Oh My Brother”

Poem by Jaki Shelton Green (7 minute listen)

North Carolina Poet Laureate Jaki Shelton Green reads from her first album, The River Speaks of Thirst.

“Black Matters”

Poem by Keith S. Wilson

A poem from Keith S. Wilson’s debut book, Fieldnotes on Ordinary Love. About the book from Poetry Daily: “Whether describing a lover, a scientific concept, or an act of racial violence, these ‘fieldnotes’ are simultaneously fantastic and grounded, celestial and corporeal.”

Thoughts on George Floyd and the social contract

Monologue by Trevor Noah (18 minute listen)

Born to a white mother and black father in South Africa under apartheid, Trevor Noah has a unique perspective on a lot of things, but especially the social construct of race. I also recommend his book, Born a Crime, which is an eye-opening and hilarious page turner. If you prefer audio books, he narrates the book and I bet it’s great.

Notice the Rage; Notice the Silence

Interview with Resmaa Menakem (51 minute listen)

Resmaa Menakem is a therapist and trauma specialist who explores how people hold trauma in their bodies. On Being is the one podcast I listen to on a regular basis. I like Krista Tippett’s interview style and the mission of On Being is similar to my own as a writer: “On Being, as it has evolved, takes up the great questions of meaning in 21st-century lives and at the intersection of spiritual inquiry, science, social healing, and the arts. What does it mean to be human, how do we want to live, and who will we be to each other?”

Going forward

This is me barely scratching the surface on the subject of race in the United States. I don’t expect to be a scholar but I will be better educated. I also want to be a better citizen in my community. And people in my community are telling me to look through a different lens, so I’m listening.

Over twenty years ago, someone recommended I try rose-colored glasses in order to see things from a new perspective. I wore those different lenses and I’m better for it. I also learned back in my twenties that I wasn’t going to arrive at being a good and happy person; simply dust off my hands and call it done. Being the person I want to be is a lifetime commitment. There’s always work to do. Every morning provides me a new opportunity.

I have started reading from this list of recommended books. Here’s another list and another for parents. My local family members started a book club and we meet for the first time this coming Monday. If you have any suggestions on what you are reading or what you are listening to, please share in the comments.

Be safe. Be well. Keep informed.

On Focus

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We’re in the 9th week of pandemic homeschool. When it comes to my six-year-old boys, focus is a daily struggle. And I get it. They don’t understand that Monday thru Friday the living room transforms into a classroom. When they see the couch, they do what they normally do: jump, climb, and wrestle. That I sit before a white board means nothing to them.

From the start, I incorporated a ‘word of the day’ into our curriculum. I let the kids pick words (hedgehog, astronomy, water), but mostly I choose words that are relevant to our immediate social emotional learning. On our first day, the word was ‘hygiene’. We’ve done ‘taunt’ and ‘annoy’. Last Friday, after a particularly hard week for me, our word was ‘resilient’. Sometime during week #5, I chose ‘focus’.

Focus*

(noun) – the center of interest or activity; an act of concentrating interest or activity on something.

(verb) – become able to see clearly; pay particular attention.

Spanish – foco, centro

Word origin – Latin (mid 17th century) as a term in geometry and physics: literally ‘domestic hearth’.

Domestic hearth?

Where the Heart Is

The hearth is ripe with symbolism, for good reason. For centuries, the hearth provided warmth in winter, light in the darkness, and cooked food. These attributes were a form of protection–from cold, illness, starvation, and predatory animals.

Hearth is the ‘heart of the house’ where we keep the ‘home fires burning’.

After the recent stay-at-home orders, I imagine people see their homes differently than they did in February. Some took the opportunity to complete honey-do lists, while others worried about making mortgage or rent payments. Some people spent two months by themselves, while those in full households would pay good money for a moment alone.

That’s a broad sweep across what people are experiencing. (It’s all the bandwidth I have at the moment.) And it doesn’t touch on the fact that for some people, home is the most unsafe place to be.

Our relationship with house and home is as varied as we are as individuals. But what most people have in common right now, is finding ways to keep Covid-19 from getting inside.

We might think our needs are different from those in the 17th century, but are they?

The domestic hearth was so important to survival, that the word for it–focus–developed into ‘pay particular attention’.

I use ‘focus’ when I teach my children. And it’s not just about the bouncing (I allow a fair amount of bouncing). I’m cultivating their capacity to concentrate, to hone in on one thing, to take a deep breath and pause (and in turn, allow space for others to focus). In my experience, the ability to center oneself aids in mental and emotional survival. I want my kids to grow into resilient adults. I want them to know how to tend the domestic hearth within themselves.

More people will be affected mentally and emotionally by Covid-19 than become physically ill. How do we not just survive the pandemic, but how do we set ourselves up to thrive?

If there is one thing that focus can teach us, it’s that paying particular attention to what provides us warmth, safety, and nourishment will help get us through. The domestic hearth is a symbol of what sustains us through hardship. And while we’re feeling anxious about the unknowns surrounding Covid-19, the hearth reminds us to sit, and be still.

*Google Dictionary which pulls from Oxford.

Feeling a need to express some emotions during this time? Check out my post on writing lyric poetry.

On Lyric Poetry

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My school-aged children attended their last day at school on March 13, 2020. The following week I transitioned my house and work-life to include homeschool. On Sunday morning I woke up early, before everyone else in the house, and cried. A good, deep cry as I sat at my new “teacher’s desk.” Then I wrote the above poem and felt a wash of relief, so I decided to write a daily poem during North Carolina’s stay-at-home orders. I post them at Coronavirus Daily and on Facebook.

As long as I’ve been writing, I’ve written lyric poetry. In fifth grade, I wrote a poem that prompted the principal to call my parents.

In Poetry as Survival, Gregory Orr says, “How to respond to the strangeness and unpredictability of our own emotional being? One important answer is the lyric, the ‘I’ poem dramatizing inner and outer experience.”

The poem in fifth grade was fiction, but I used the dramatized “I” in order to relate to the content of the poem, which was about sexual abuse. It was 1985, missing kids were on milk cartons and “stranger danger” had been debunked. While writing the poem for a class assignment, I didn’t know I was trying to reconcile that people I trusted might harm me. I used “I” in the poem to get inside my feelings about the new information that changed my view of the world. My teacher thought it was a confession, which prompted the call from the principal.

What is lyric poetry?

Lyric Poetry* – (From Greek for “lyre,” an ancient stringed instrument.) Originally, poetry was meant to be sung, accompanied by music from the lyre or lute.

Lyric poetry now refers to a category of poetry (distinct from narrative poetry and dramatic poetry). A lyric poem is:

  • short in form
  • concentrated in its expression
  • subjective in its observations
  • personal in subject matter
  • song-like in quality

The relief that came over me when I wrote that first coronavirus-inspired poem is a strong thread of what has sustained me through the past five weeks. My family and I are extremely fortunate so far. We’re healthy. We still have income. We have food and shelter. The added stress in my life is, at this point, minimal in comparison to so many others. But the stress is there–the pandemic touches us all. And just like in fifth grade, writing lyric poetry helps reconcile my emotions.

Orr tells us that “Human culture ‘invented’ or evolved the personal lyric as a means of helping individuals survive the existential crises represented by extremities of subjectivity and also by such outer circumstances as poverty, suffering, pain, illness, violence, or loss of a loved one.”

The Covid-19 pandemic prompted a larger-than-usual collective existential crisis. As a society, we’re redefining what is “essential” in our daily lives. We’re questioning value and purpose. When this is all just a story we tell the next generations, what will we say changed within us? What strengthened? Why?

Write a lyric poem!

It’s difficult to feel hope and suffering–two opposing emotions–at the same time. It’s even tougher to sustain feeling them indefinitely. Yet that is what the pandemic is prompting us to do: be hopeful that we will overcome and be mindful and sympathetic to the suffering.

What do we do with our new emotions? It’s not like any problems we had in our lives before the pandemic disappeared. How do we cope?

In an interview, Benedictine monk David Steindl-Rast says, “Joy is the happiness that doesn’t depend on what happens…Happiness is not steady, but joy can be steady, and that’s what we really want. We want the happiness that lasts.”

For me, writing and sharing a daily poem is a joy through the pandemic that doesn’t depend on what happens. Whether it’s a tough day homeschooling kids, hedging our finances against the possibility of losing income, hearing stories of those suffering because of the pandemic, or the blanket uncertainty in our collective recovery, I have a joy I can depend on. It’s not exactly the deep joy that Br. Steindhl-Rast talks about. I think it’s my way to sustain steady happiness. Writing daily poems built a tangible thread through uncertain times. I transformed my inner experience into something I could see and share.

Tips to write a lyric poem.

I opened the window and laughter blew in
  • Start with “I” –the subjective and personal experience.
  • Do something in the poem. A simple act you do often. “I opened the window.”
  • Think of something that relates to the act you wrote down. It could be another action or an idea, a whimsical thought, or an emotion. “I opened the window and the breeze brushed my cheek.” “I opened the window and my eyes softened.” “I opened the window, tears down my cheeks.”
  • Keep going, making associations between physical actions, ideas, emotions, or thoughts.
  • Try not to think too much, let the first action inspire the next action or idea, and so on.
  • Having trouble? You know the game where you say a word and another person has to say the first thing that pops into their head? It’s like that. If you can’t think of anything, go back to the physical act that you know. “I opened the window and walked to the kitchen. I sliced a strawberry and thought of summers with my grandmother…”
  • Have fun. Stay safe. Find joy.

*Myers, Jack, Don C. Wukasch, eds. Dictionary of Poetic Terms. Denton: University of North Texas Press, 2003.