Tag: life humor

On kids and their instinctsJune 14th, 2012

My dog and i were out for a walk the other morning on trails behind our house. To set a relevant context, I’ll tell you that dogs run free on those trails and that my dog, though poorly trained and maybe overly enthusiastic, is  small, weighing in at 18 pounds.

We don’t usually meet anyone out there in the morning, much to Rosie’s dismay. She loves to jump up on people’s legs, and she loves to terrorize other dogs.

On this morning, i saw a woman,  maybe 50 metres up ahead on the trail, doing something funny with her arms. We got a bit closer and saw there were kids behind her, and she was holding her arms out front towards us, and crossed, like she was fending off a vampire. She was crouching a bit, too, as though preparing for some martial art i don’t know about.

Is everything all right, i asked, as we got closer.

I’ve got little kids behind me, she said.

I see, i said.

The whole school is coming, she said. Hundreds of kids.

It took a minute to understand that she was afraid of Rosie being free around the kids. Which seemed ridiculous to me, and evidence our protect-us-from-all-harm-and-all-fun era.

I put Rose on the lead.

Here’s the bit that freaks me out.

We passed 200 kids, and perhaps 20 teachers, or teacher’s aids, or educational assistants (whatever they’re called now). Every time a group of ten or so passed us, the kids went wild, wanting to pat Rosie.  Of course they wanted to.  Open hearts like each other.

And the teachers, for the most part, did not want that. You could hear it in their voices. Danger!

But they didn’t say that. Instead, they said this: Leave the dog alone. The dog wants its privacy!

Another one: Don’t touch the dog! The dog is not a part of this walk!

Another one: Stay away from the dog! It doesn’t want your hands all over it!

Etc.

All the while, Rosie was straining at the lead, doing her best to be touched by them, putting on her cutest face and her cutest tail wag.

One kid, held back by her teacher, shouted, I WOULD REALLY LOVE TO KISS YOUR DOG! I could have kissed her for saying what she felt.

And i thought, oh, man, there is a lot of dishonesty going on here. I get the safety thing, and the liability thing, but pay attention to what that dishonesty is doing.

Don’t tell children that the dog wants privacy! That teaches kids that their excellent instincts are false and off the mark. Surely the purpose of any education is to teach us the opposite.

This went on for roughly 199 kids.

Trailing behind the entire group were a teacher and a boy with cerebral palsy. The boy adored Rosie. He got so vocal about it that i took her over to meet him. His teacher looked on cautiously and quietly. The boy stroked Rosie, and I wish you’d seen the change that came over his entire body. Although i didn’t understand every word that came out of his mouth,  it cracked my heart in half, it was so beautiful.

It’s not that i don’t feel for the teachers and their  responsibility. But i feel more for those kids.

Many thanks to that one teacher who let that one kid follow his instincts. You are a gem. And many thanks to all of those kids for showing me what it looks like to shout, I WOULD REALLY LOVE TO KISS YOUR DOG!

I hope we all find our way back to our instincts, one way or another. It feels as though everything important depends on it.

Thanks for the conversation,

kristin

 


Tags: , , , , ,

Posted in blog | 2 Comments »

Who Are You?March 21st, 2011

I was at a funeral on the weekend. A very charming, intelligent friend of my lovely man took off the tight shoe sometime last week after a full 82 years.

Here’s what whacked me: His body was there. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen anything but an urn at a funeral. Jeez, it’s unnerving, a bit like being in a wax museum except that Johnny Depp and Marilyn Munroe are absent and we’re all pretending this body is the real thing. We’re pretending this is Ferg.

“He looks good,” someone says.

Who looks good? The thing, the entity in the casket? At the risk of going all Abbot and Costello, there was no who in that casket, there was a what.

It makes me want to sit in a circle with everyone I know and ask, “who are you, to the best of your knowledge, without the bits you’ll leave behind?”

If I have nothing to do with this body, this face, these eyes, and this voice, and nothing to do with the bodies around me ( my kids’ bodies, my friends’ bodies, or suits, or whatever they actually are), who am I?

I’m clear (I think) about not being my profession,  my passions, my stuff, my stories,  my massive inadequacies and inadequate strengths, my tastes, my crummy habits, my humour and my dead seriousness, my absurd affection for my dog, and my not-so-absurd affection for my kids and lovely man.

What’s left?

I can only tell you what I suspect. I suspect that I come from capital-L-Love, that i’m a drop in the ocean, a photon in the big sky of Love, and that my bit of Love operates through this body and all its occupations.

It’s not much, but I like the implications.

  1. If I’m right, you are also a drop of capital-L-Love, which means we’re practically identical twins whether or not we like each other or are bombing the nuclear hell out of each other
  2. I’m comforted by the recycling potential, by the idea that my drop can come and go and come again, perhaps in a different suit, perhaps in the suit of someone  who will not be bombing this time around.
  3. When I take care to create good relationships, I’m closer to  the Truth of Love (and the truth of who i am) than when I am diminishing you in any way.  I feel great when i act from Love.  I feel like hell when i don’t.
  4. I like the combination of humility and grandness inherent in being a drop  in the ocean of Love. No big deal on my own, but the source of all life when I    remember who I am.  Feels good being tiny and enormous.

Last thing.  I have evidence.  If i came from Portugal, Portuguese cooking (those huge sardines, say) would rock my socks.  I’d love it or hate it or have some significant response to it. Same goes for the language, the smells, and the sounds of Portugal.  I’m fairly sure i don’t come from Portugal.

But Love! At Ferg’s funeral, someone read a poem he’d written to his wife a year after she died.  A love poem for a woman who’d been gone for a full year.  The house wept.  That’s because they recognized Love.

I struggle with the distant relationship i have with some of my brothers.  I suspect i  struggle because I come from Love.  I’m homesick.

I can only contemplate work that builds bridges and raises self-esteem (yours and mine).  It’s the only skill set that matters to me, because i come from Love.

My heart hardens, softens, breaks, and breaks wide open in response to Love. Over and over and over.  In movies, in friendships, in the news, at weddings, at funerals.  Portuguese sardines do not do this to me.  Love does.

So.  The truest answer i can get to is, I come from Love. I’m a wee bit of Love and i recognize Love when she shouts  out the window to my homesick heart.  I am Love’s kid, Love’s hope, Love’s chance on this planet, Love’s sappy-happy acolyte.  That’s good enough for me.

Who are you? Are you Portuguese?  Are you Love? Are you just a large sardine who doesn’t care one way or the other?

Thanks to Ferg for not being in that body, and for coming from Love, which is a great home town.  Thanks to you for the conversation,

kristin


Tags: , , , , ,

Posted in blog | 14 Comments »

New Thwack, Same LoveJanuary 17th, 2011

So my lovely man has this malignant tumour in his eye, and after waiting long enough that we could have grown a very slow vegetable garden, we’re leaving for Toronto this morning so that he can have his eye removed.

People say, oh, how do you do it, is he devastated, i can’t imagine how that feels, etc., etc.

Truth is it feels like regular life, but with the colour turned up a bit.  By that, i mean that this is a larger obstacle than usual (than boredom, than money, than career choices, than finding my way around in Bangkok), but it’s still an obstacle. An unexpected thwack in the head.  And what matters, what comes in handy,  is the skills we’ve already developed to deal with thwacks in the head.

On good days (and most of them are good), we focus on what matters.  Do we know what makes us happiest and what matters most to us? Do we know how to listen to our hearts rather than our heads? Can we really listen to each other in this relationship? Can we act from love rather than from fear?

All the questions are the same.  Which makes me want to suggest that we’re wise to know ourselves as well as we can and to practice being here, now.  This practice is the way through boredom or Bangkok.  It’s the way through every single day of regular life. The same practice is the way when it’s cancer, life, and death.

Life is big.  Sometimes bigger than i’d like.  Not for a second does that change the fact that Love wins, and that my greatest task, no matter how big life gets, is to remember that.


Tags: , ,

Posted in blog | 14 Comments »

Trust SandwichDecember 21st, 2010

My son is in his first year at The National Theatre School, which he sometimes calls The National Becoming A Human School.  One of the roughly 14,500 things he loves about school (only a few of which we covered during a five hour breakfast last week) is lunch. In the cafeteria.

There’s this lunch guy, Isaac , pronounced E-tzack, because he’s French, who works in the NTS cafeteria.  (Adrian, my son,  says something amazing must go on at job interviews there, because every single employee is interesting and passionate about being there.)  When Adrian orders lunch, he can do it the regular way if he wants.  Or, get this, he can order a Trust Sandwich, in which case Isaac, pronounced, E-tzack, will make something fabulous and original with Adrian in mind.

I swoon, contemplating this.  This is how cafeteria food can make us well.

Take this, somebody, and apply it in your home, in your workplace, at your gym, at your grocery store.  And see how quickly this changes everything.

Get back to me on how it goes, will you?  I’d love to hear.

Thanks for the conversation,

kristin


Tags: , , , ,

Posted in blog | 2 Comments »

Beginning AgainDecember 9th, 2010

beginnersmindbackpack.jpgI’ve just celebrated my one year anniversary with yoga. My classes at the studio began last October, and last December I started practicing at home so that I might not continue to die after every class.

Neither the beginner’s crazy enthusiasm nor the beginner’s intimidation has left me.

My stomach whirlygigs a bit to say this, but I’m about to launch into another new phase of yoga. For the next three months I’ll be traveling with a tiny backpack, yoga clothes, and enough electronic equipment (the cords! the plug adapters! the surge protectors!) to send notes here, to you, and to the rest of the cosmos.

There are plenty of life goals forming around this trip. My yoga goal is to take my enthusiasm, curiosity, and abject fear, and see what yoga looks like through beginner’s eyes in Thailand, Laos, Vietnam, and Cambodia. There is no chance my experience will be comprehensive, but with luck I’ll gather a few wonderful stories. I hope you’ll join me. I also hope you’ll continue to share your own thoughts.  We’ve had quite a trip together already, haven’t we?
Thanks to the thrills that come with being new at this. Thanks to life for its open doors, and thanks, always, to you for the conversation,
kristin

Dr.
Kristin Shepherd is a chiropractor, actor, and speaker (About All
Things Wonderful) in North Bay, Ontario.  Join her on the web,
on Facebook,
and on Twitter,
and on iTunes.



Tags: , , , ,

Posted in adventure, travel, Yoga, yogaontheroad | No Comments »

And When The Idea of Joy is Just Depressing?October 13th, 2010

On our cynical days, we say, oh please, you think joy is possible, or effective, or realistic? And i say, yes, it’s all three. But if it isn’t within reach today, if the idea of joy is depressing, try one of joy’s younger siblings, instead: Try hope for something a bit better tomorrow, try mild optimism, try ten seconds of peace. Try anything that gives you more energy right now. We’ll find our way back to joy that way. (Thanks to Esther.)


Tags: , , , ,

Posted in blog | 3 Comments »

Are You Looking at Me?September 29th, 2010

Eye contact is a funny thing.  I’ve just returned from a meditation camp during which we spent hours and hours staring into each others’ eyes.  It was strange and tense to begin with, but delicious and strangely satisfying before long.

During a regular day at home, I’m deflated whenever the guy at the Tim Horton’s drive-through doesn’t look at me. (Tim Hortons is the iconic Canadian coffee stop for those of you from some place else.)  I want to crawl through the little window and hold his face until he gets that it matters.

On the other hand, i’m unnerved by people who stare into my eyes for longer than a few seconds. ( Ed, for example, while he plays harmonica in my clinic.)

I wonder: Are we uncomfortable being seen fully and completely?  Is that why we look away when someone continues to look into our eyes?

And this:  Are we uncomfortable looking deeply and curiously, lovingly and lingeringly into the eyes of someone else?  Why?

Our eyes are beautiful, and absolutely connected to the truest part of ourselves, whether you call that heart or soul.

Why don’t we try something together? If you care to, try more eye contact this week.  Look and be looked into.  See how it feels.

I’d love to hear what you learn.

Thanks, always, for the conversation,

kristin


Tags: , , , ,

Posted in blog | 5 Comments »

EdSeptember 20th, 2010

A man named Ed comes to my clinic every second Wednesday. He arrives 40 minutes before my afternoon hours begin. When I ask him why he arrives so early, he says he can’t keep himself away from me. Ed is 80 years old.

He begins each appointment by paying me, in case he forgets on the way out. Then he drops a bag on the counter, saying, you can eat these or throw them out, whatever you like. There is always an apple in the bag. The other contents vary. This week he brought a Kitkat bar and two doughnuts he’d made the night before. He’d prefer a fatter version of me.

After taking care of Ed’s remarkably healthy back, we come back to my front desk, at which point he pulls out his harmonica. He plays my favourite (You Are My Sunshine) and then whichever tune he’s been working on all week. He’s happiest if there are now people waiting for their own appointments. He’s best with a sizable audience.

I bought a harmonica two years ago, promising Ed I’d learn to play so that we could do Christmas carols together. It’s harder than it looks. I gave my harmonica to Ed last Christmas.

I told Ed last week that I’m closing my clinic soon. He didn’t say much. Well. I see. I see. When he played You Are My Sunshine he stared at me for all he was worth through his thick glasses. He said, I’ll see you in two weeks, and he left.

I’m telling you this for two reasons.

First, I want to share Ed with you before I leave my clinic. If you see him, ask him to play for you. He’ll be looking for a new venue.

Second, it’s tempting to shut my heart down, just slightly, while telling people I’m leaving. I love them, and I don’t love being sad, but I suspect it’s truer and healthier to let goodbyes stare us in the face and heart.

Thanks to Ed for teaching me that, and thanks to you for the conversation,

kristin


Tags: , , ,

Posted in blog | 2 Comments »

Walking the Plank of ChangeSeptember 3rd, 2010

A few posts ago, i mentioned i’m ending my clinical practice of 20 years.  I told you i’d let you know how it was going.

Well, here it is.  My last day in clinic is October 22nd….  There’s the update, really.

I expected insomnia, gnashing of teeth, gnashing of finger- and toenails, scaly, weeping bald patches, you name it.  I expected a lot of fear.

True, i don’t know what i’ll do for a living next.  True, i haven’t been unemployed since i started babysitting 34 years ago.  True, this would have “shivered me timbers” (why a pirate idiom?  i have no idea) even two years ago.

Well holy anticlimax, pirates.  Maybe all of the gnashing happened before the decision.  I don’t know.  All i feel to date is an  sense of peace in my chest.  And freedom.  And a small thrill of adventure.

Funny.  It occurs to me that fear before the fact was my constant companion.  I’ll bet that background fear interferes with our vision in some ways.  I’ll bet it interferes with us seeing our own desires clearly.  (A bit like a black  eye patch, come to think of it!)

I’ve found a lovely, kind chiropractor with an open mind and good ears who is happy to welcome the folks from my clinic.  Thank you Greg.

And the folks at my clinic are as beautiful as ever, which will break my heart wide open at the end of October.  Nothing wrong with that.

I report this non-report in case you’ve been gnashing your own toenails about a decision.  It appears the gnashing ends with a step forward.

Granted, this may all change between now and October 22nd.  (I’ll bet not, but I’ll keep you posted.)

Thanks to every gorgeous heart in my clinic.  Thanks to the futures that call and call and call us forward.

And arrrhhh, thanks to you, you captain of the Caribbean,  for the conversation,

kristin

Join me on Facebook at Dr.Kristin Shepherd and on Twitter at kristinwonders. ( How many conversations can one pirate have?)


Tags: , , , , , ,

Posted in blog | 8 Comments »

Everything Starts Again NowJune 24th, 2010

26_OM.jpgYears ago, a friend named Tracy offered me an acting tip that has become part of every on-and-off-stage day of my life. It also affects my yoga.

We were in a play called Good Night Desdemona. I had to travel through time each night by disappearing through an absurdly small garbage can into, well, into the past to meet both Desdemona and Juliet. I climbed towers, faught with swords, was nearly strangled by Desdemona, and iambic pentameter-ed my way through seven enormous monologues that would have humbled Hamlet. It was a monster of a challenge.

On more than one night, I cursed myself for getting something wrong–missing lines, breaking my sword (tough to fight convincingly with a sword stump), not projecting my lines from under the pillow Desdemona used to suffocate me, etc.

One night, Tracy (Juliet) heard me whacking myself to smithereens at intermission.
“No way,” she said. Gotta stop that.

She said we can’t afford to criticize ourselves. It takes us out of our story, out of our best skills, and it ruins our relationship with other actors and our audience. It ruins our relationship with everything to come.

Practice instant forgiveness, she says. It’s the best tool there is for an actor. Everything starts again now.

This morning, in a seated forward bend, I thought, holy Toledo, my hamstrings are tight. Not enough yoga and too many butter tarts yesterday. (I don’t see the relationship between the two, now, but they felt completely connected this morning.)

And right behind it, like a great actor on cue, I thought; instant forgiveness, honey. Everything starts again now. Which saved the show.

Thanks to Tracy for the acting lesson, and thanks to you for the conversation.

Kristin practices yoga, theatre, public speaking, writing, and chiropractic in North Bay, Ontario, at kristinshepherd.ca and at Dr. Kristin Shepherd on Facebook.


Tags: , , , ,

Posted in Yoga | No Comments »