The D Spot

Over Thanksgiving weekend I read a book that I have been wanting to read for a long time.  Called The Last Lecture, this book is a recounting of the final lecture presented by computer science professor Randy Pausch as part of a lecture series at the Carnegie Mellon University.  Randy’s lecture was titled “Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams”, and although he talked about exactly this, it was far more than that.

Before reading the book, I knew very little about Randy Pausch other than the fact that he had delivered an extraordinary speech before his untimely death at a young age leaving behind his beloved wife and three small children.

It was an easy read and yet, even after reading as many books on personal growth and intentional, positive living as I have, he shared a number of wonderful lessons that I have been thinking about ever since.

The one that resonates the most with me is about perseverance and determination, and yet, is remarkably simple at the same time.  Essentially, nothing that you or I haven’t heard before, but for whatever reason, his presentation of it reinforced my own sense of responsibility and personal power.

Randy says, “Brick walls are there for a reason.  They give us a chance to show how badly we want something.”

BAM!  What a simple and powerful statement!!

While reading this, I was reminded of just how persistent we must be when we really, truly want something for ourselves.  So often when we come up against our own brick walls, we retreat in fear, frustration or fury.  Instead of remaining committed to our goal and increasing our efforts to reach it, we view the obstacle as too big to overcome, to exhausting to deal with or too much to handle.  You know what I am talking about?

These brick walls are given to us for a reason, and provide us with an opportunity not only to grow, but to review and revise our strategy for moving forward.  It is all in the way that we view them and how we choose to respond to them.

Despite my best attempts, I too find myself occasionally giving up way to quickly and feeling frustrated at experiencing yet another roadblock.    Or, worse, taking the “low and easy road” when responding and making the situation even worse for myself.   Has this ever happened to you?

When going through and moving forward after divorce it can feel like you come up against one brick wall after the other and therefore the challenges also feel insurmountable and your dreams, vision and goals unachievable.   But it is not true!  It is only the lens through which you are looking…a lens that reflects your temporary exhaustion, sadness, fear and frustration!

Randy, through his last lecture, shares with us the gifts that our brick walls have to give.  That they are there to inspire us, to raise our bar and fight through our fears as we push forward and go out and get what we want.  His words are written so that his children will know who he is.  So that they will understand his character and the values that he holds dear.  At the same time that he helps us to reframe how we face our brick walls, he reminds us that our even greater obligation is to remember that we are modeling for and teaching our children and those we love.  How we move forward sets the standard for our children and informs their values.   How we live our life is the legacy we leave our children, our families and our community.

His message is powerful.

Randy’s book reignited a passion in me to focus on my dreams and commit to doing whatever it takes to achieve them.

Whatever your latest challenge, it will not be the last brick wall that you will be faced with.   I hope that now, when it does come, you will choose to view it as an opportunity.  And that you will not only get clear on exactly what you do want, but accept the challenge as a way for you to prove just how badly you want it!

As you embrace your brick walls, please share them so that we can all celebrate your courage, strength and perseverance!

I decided to write this to you on June 21, the longest day of the year…the summer solstice! It also happens to be the day of my son’s 8th grade graduation!

I watched as he stood to be recognized and was surprised at just how emotional I got.

He is my youngest child, and as I saw he and his friends celebrating their conclusion of middle school, I couldn’t help but feel the days, weeks, months and years slipping by so very quickly.

Where has the time gone?

It has been almost 7 years since my divorce and at moments, the pain is still as great as it was when it first happened. As I sat in the sea of parents during the graduation ceremony, I was again reminded of how I never imagined that I would get divorced when I walked down the aisle at my wedding so many years ago.

It is in these moments, or milestones, that I feel the loss of what was….what could have been….what was “supposed” to be.

And yet, even with these emotions that surface every now and again, I am also aware of how my divorce was, in the end, a blessing.

My relationship with my ex-husband was not ideal for me. And it was not exceptional. In fact, my divorce allowed me to find the inner joy and happiness that I so desperately sought while I was married.

No, I never wanted a divorce…who does? But it was the best thing for me, as a woman.

There is both sadness and nostalgia at every event that celebrates our children, because there is no one else that will feel the same depth of emotion about them other than me except their father. It is that bond as their parents that will always be there.

But, after shedding a few tears and allowing the moment to pass, I realized that I am incredibly happy in my new life. I love my relationship with my children. I love that I have created a life around all that I am and all that I want to be. I could not do that while in my marriage.

So, another milestone goes by and I now have both of my children in high school. It won’t be long until they are heading off to college, to begin their own exceptional lives.

And while I wish I could slow down time…I also know that these next few years with them will be full of growth for all of us, and it is exciting! It is my job to model for them what it means to live a life of joy and fulfillment, deliberately creating exactly what you want. To do that, I again re-commit myself to being a happy, whole and healthy woman and mother.

For those of you who have enjoyed graduations, moving up ceremonies and other milestones for your children this spring, CONGRATULATIONS! And, I hope you know that it is normal and appropriate to feel a mixed bag of emotions….for that is the real deal of divorce!

Embrace all of them, and join me in re-committing to taking care of YOU so that you can be the best possible woman and mother you can be!!!

Shared custody.

This sounded fair at the time, especially because I respect and encourage a strong and healthy relationship between my two boys and their father and believe that shared custody is in the best interests of all children wherever possible.

However knowing that it is “fair” and that it is the custody arrangement that is in the best interest of my children meant nothing when it was time for them to go to their father’s for the first time.  I watched them go knowing that I would not see them again for four days.  As they pulled out of the driveway the tears began to fall.

Four days.  Four days without my children.  How was I going to bear the lonliness of it? I was overwhelmed with the loss of what I had always wanted, to be a mother 24 hours a day, seven days a week.  Now what?

I made it through the first week…barely, and then the second.  Each week became a little easier as I started filling up my time with friends, meetings, appointments, errands and anything that I could do to make the empty feeling go away.

Well that was almost 7 years ago.  And over time I have come to (dare I say) enjoy having a bit of free time to reconnect to myself,  enjoy new relationships, spend time with friends and work on my business without it taking away from time with my children.

Sharing your children with your Ex is something that is part of divorce.  But you never get used to it.

You never get used to going to sleep at night knowing that your children’s beds are empty in their rooms.  You never get used to missing the opportunity to take care of them when they are sick in the middle of the night.  You never get used to going entire days without seeing or speaking to them.

I have come to feel GRATEFUL for the invention of texting technology. Yes, I said it.  Texting.  While my oldest son is now driving and I am scared to death of the texting while driving statistics, I am still grateful for the technology that allows me to communicate with them anytime, day or night.

If you have teenagers, you realize that they only want to talk with you and hang out with you when it is convenient for them and they are interested, which is not often.  Because divorce often includes shared custody, this already small amount of time they are interested in talking to you is made even less by having them only part the week.

When they were small, I would only be able to speak to them on the phone when they were with their father if the timing worked out, otherwise I could go a few days without seeing or speaking to them.  And I missed my children terribly.

With cell phone technology and the invention of texting, the game changed.  Yes I call them whenever I want to hear their voices, but again, teenagers only answer the phone when they want to.  They, too, screen their calls and mom doesn’t always make the list.  However,  I have come to learn that they always read their text messages!

So now I get to say “Good morning, have a great day today!” every morning.  And I get to send them goodnight wishes and kisses every night.  I even send them random, “I love you” texts during the day when I am feeling the ache of missing them.

The truth is that they don’t always text me back. Sometimes they are in the mood to talk and call me back instead of texting.   But I know that they always read my text messages.   And they know that I am thinking about them and loving them 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

And while it is not a substitute for seeing them, it allows me to share my love, support, humor, and often pertinent information with them directly and often.

We don’t need permission to connect to our children.  We don’t need to have custody of our children every day to connect to them.   All we need to do is love them and let them know it, any way we can.

Oh, and the answer to the question?  NO.  You never get used to sharing your children, not even with your Ex.  But, the joy of technology means that there are more and more ways to connect with them while you are apart.

If  you have found creative ways of connecting with your children when they are with your Ex, I welcome and encourage you to share them with us!

So, how was your Mother’s Day?  I got lovely email messages from so many friends and colleagues, however it seems as though it was not necessarily a “joyous” day for all of you.

For many, Mother’s Day can bring up sadness and loss, and for others, custody arrangements may not permit them to be with their children.

In the spirit of honesty, I only got to see one of my children on Mother’s Day, the other had a basketball tournament out of state, and Sunday night is the night my Ex has custody of them.  And, despite popular belief, the day I spent with my youngest son, while really nice, was in no way all “butterflies and rainbows”.

In one of the workshops that I did last week a woman interrupted me mid-sentence, and in a fairly contentious way asked how I could mislead the group to whom I was talking.

Huh??

Me, mislead??

She went on to say, “How could you not tell “them” what it will really be like?  That it is unfair, and costly, and challenging, and…..”

Do you get the picture?

I let her finish her thoughts, hearing in her voice the pain of all that she had been through herself.

And for a moment, I thought to myself…do I mislead anyone to think that divorce is somehow all about “rainbows and butterflies”?  That it is easy…or fair?

No.  I don’t.

Just like my own Mother’s Day was not exactly what my ideal day would have been like…it was perfect just the way it was.  It was REAL.

Despite Hallmark’s attempt to lead me to believe that if my children don’t wake me up to a four course breakfast in bed then they are not really good, loving children, I know how much my children love me and they know that I love them…unconditionally, even without a homemade frittata served to me in bed!

Divorce is NOT all about the “butterflies and rainbows”.

It is NOT fair.

It is NOT perfect and surely NOT exactly what we thought our IDEAL life would include.

However, it is REAL.

It is the way it is.

It is also an opportunity to design an ideal life for ourselves.  It is a catalyst for transformation, reclaiming ourselves and deliberately creating what we want our life to look and feel like.

We can cling to the notion that life is unfair and that we are victims of our circumstance…but that is not really true and it will get us nowhere…fast.

We CAN, however, CHOOSE to open ourselves up to what comes next…even if it frightening, overwhelming and uncomfortable!  It is in this journey that we will find the greatest growth, and ultimately, the greatest joy!

I am right there with you…designing what comes next and open to all of the possibilities that present themselves!

So, how was YOUR Mother’s Day?  Was it REAL?!   I am eager to hear how you chose to celebrate the day the incredibly important role you play as a mother yourself or the daughter of a wonderful woman!

As we approach this weekend, I couldn’t celebrate Mother’s Day without sharing a few of my thoughts with you.

I have done a great deal of reflecting lately on my role as a mother.  My two boys are ages 14 and 16, are rapidly approaching becoming young men.  As I watch them slowly mature into young men I am struck by who they are becoming.  My older son enjoys going out with girls and I spend a lot of time watching and observing how he is developing as a partner in an intimate relationship.

My youngest will enter high school in the fall and again, I am overwhelmed by what a fantastic young man he is becoming and his journey towards creating his independent identity.

While I recognize that there are differences between raising boys and raising girls, there is one thing that I know for sure is the same regardless. And that is that we, as mothers, represent what we hope they will either become as young women or will respect in women.  We are one of the two MOST influential people in their lives…and have an incredible influence on who they will become.

WOW…what a tremendous responsibility and privilege.

They are watching our every move.

• The things we say and the way we say them.
• The choices we make.
• The way we behave…and why.

As I counsel my boys through relationship issues (with friends and in early romances), accepting the consequences of their actions, and the challenges of having to make difficult choices, I realize just how incredibly pivotal our role as a mother is.

It is this recognition that has enabled me to strive towards becoming the BEST “me” that I can possibly be.

It is the inspiration behind every action I take and every word I speak.

I take the role of being a mother seriously and make every day an opportunity to teach them how to take bold and courageous steps towards creating their ideal life.

While it is a few years away, I can already feel the beginning of their separation from me and their desire to move independently along in their own lives.  And I support them fully in taking those scary first steps towards self sufficiency.

I will consider it my greatest success if my children move forward with the clarity, courage and confidence they need to design their own extraordinary lives.

So with this in mind, I will celebrating my role as a mother this Sunday!  My children and I will be joining my own mother to celebrate…after all, she is the one who modeled for me what an exceptional parent and mother is.

For those of you that are mothers, I hope that you will join me in honoring YOU and the vital role that you play in your children’s lives…no matter what age they are!

Have a wonderful mother’s day!