As many of you know, I just got back from spending 20 days in Costa Rica with my family. Hunter spent the entire time hanging out with his cousins. Jeff wasn’t able to go with us this time, and I made it a point to stay offline for the duration of the trip. For these reasons, I had a LOT of “me time”… time to think, and to get to know myself.

If I could only give you one bit of advice, it would be this:

KNOW YOURSELF.

I’ve come to realize that there are no right answers… but some feel more “right” than the rest. We each have to find what those answers are.

No matter how much time we spend with others, or how much of ourselves we share, no one else can ever fully know us. We are infinitely too complex and ever-changing to fit neatly into any pattern or profile.

Only we can know ourselves. In any circumstance, at all times, no matter what the variables, only we have full access to the secret chambers of our hearts, and enigmatic labyrinths of our minds.

There are at least ten things we should each know about ourselves, ten questions we should be able to answer with ease:

1. What matters most to me?

2. What bothers me the most (about myself, others, or the world)?

3. Who enriches my life experience?

4. Who makes my life more difficult than it needs to be?

5. What do I believe beyond the shadow of a doubt?

6. What conditions make me happy?

7. What conditions make me miserable?

8. Is there something or someone I can’t live without?

9. Is everything that is in my life necessary, and adding value?

10. Am I making progress towards a goal of my choosing?

These are but a few of the questions I pondered during my three-week sabbatical, and I found my answers for each of them.

You may recall from my post, Costa Rica is Paradise (and Why I Don’t Live There) that, contrary to all probability, I’ve never been inclined to make Costa Rica my permanent home. It is a beautiful country; I love my friends and family there; the food is great, and it’s an all-around wonderful place to be. And yet, as I confirmed again on this trip, it isn’t the place for me.

I will greatly miss my family and friends, but must get back to my life… the one I have chosen, and created… the one that feels right to me. I can do this, and feel certain about my decision, because I know myself.

While I was in Costa Rica, I realized something else about myself: I am not a blogger. I have enjoyed my blogging experiment, and I am so grateful for all the friends I’ve met online, but blogging is not for me. There’s probably no way I could ever explain this in a way that would make sense to everyone, but I know it to be true.

Every great adventure must come to an end, and so it is with this Quest for Balance. The time has come for a new beginning. I wish I could tell you I know what this new phase of my life will look like, but I don’t. I’m just excited to see what comes next.

Of course, I’ll still be “around”… reading my favorite blogs, and reachable by email. But I plan to spend most of my time offline. I don’t want to spend my time reading about life, or even writing about life. I want to be out there, Living it.

“Whatever we may think or believe, what we have done is our story.” (Fulghum)

I hope to DO a bunch of things with this beautiful Vermont Spring… go for nature hikes, grow vegetables in the community garden, dabble in art, take a dance class, visit some covered bridges, spend time with friends, frequent the farmer’s markets, enjoy local cuisine, ride bikes with my family, take lots of pictures, hang out in the library, look for shapes in the clouds… there’s no tellin’, really.

I just want Life, The Universe and Everything to know this:

I’m here… ready, willing and able to make the most of each day. I will not take this life, or the people in it, for granted. I am eternally grateful for all the blessings I’ve been given.

Thank YOU for being here for this awesome journey, and…

So Long!!

10 Things You Should Know About Yourself (aka: “So Long, And Thanks For All The Fish!”) is a post from: Quest for Balance

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Stress kills. Period. Stress, anxiety, worry, fear, panic… these sorts of things start as psychological or emotional discomforts, but end up manifesting as physical illnesses. Our bodies create symptoms as a red flag to our brains: “Whatever you are doing, STOP IT!!!”

Recently I told you I was waiting for a diagnosis, because I felt worse than I’d ever felt in my life. My blood work, chest X-rays, and EKG all came back squeaky clean. I’m fit as a fiddle (contrary to all probability, given my lifestyle). This was great news, but didn’t answer the question of why I felt like I was dying.

As it turns out, the answer seems to be… stress.

The doc and I had actually dismissed this possible diagnosis early on in the question-and-answer session because I’m about as chillaxed as a person can get. I don’t work, my kid doesn’t go to school, I don’t have complicated family relations, or any of the usual stress factors. I’m not over-scheduled, frazzled, or spreading myself too thin. I don’t exactly fit the “stress case” profile–I’m a case study in how to remain calm. So we went ahead with the testing, just to be safe.

Once I passed all my tests with flying colors (I’ve always been a great test-taker, you know) we started digging deeper… below the surface. What I’m realizing is that there is such a thing as too chillaxed. I may be relaxing myself to death. Because I am so determined to keep a mellow vibe, live a simple life, remain calm and not let things bother me, what I’m doing instead is bottling up stuff inside.

I don’t freak out; I internalize. I don’t take frustrations out on others (which is nice), but I swallow them whole (projecting them onto my vital organs). Remaining calm in stressful situations is good in that it keeps the stress level from escalating into dangerous territory, but this only works if the stressful emotions are resolved in a healthy fashion.

I need to find an outlet for life’s little “bite my lip and grind my teeth” moments. These are a few tricks I use, when something stressful happens, to stay level-headed and effective:

1. DON’T PANIC – This reminds me to keep my head on straight… and makes me think of Douglas Adams, which always makes me smile.

2. TAKE THE PLACEBO – Everyone has some thing or some ritual that they firmly believe helps them relax. Whether it is scientifically proven to work or not is irrelevant. What matters is that it works for the individual… maybe it’s yoga, meditation, exercise, drinking a cup of chamomile tea, whatever. I like to do the ritual upfront, so I can breathe deeply (oxygenate my brain for optimal function).

3. GATHER INFORMATION – This is like the discovery process in a legal case, when you gather all relevant information, files, research, phone numbers, and anything else that even remotely pertains to the problem you are trying to solve. The trick is to not spend too much time in this phase, so get what you really need and move on.

4. MAKE LIST 1 – These are the variables you CAN control… it’s your to-do list, items you will need to accomplish in the next day, or week, or month, in order to solve the problem.

5. MAKE LIST 2 - These are things that worry you, but you can do nothing about. For instance, you CAN book a last minute flight. You might panic that the weather may delay your flight, but you CAN’T do anything about the weather. So this goes on List 2. You have acknowledged it as an item that worries you, but you are putting it out of your head for the time being, in order to focus on List 1.

6. TACKLE LIST 1 – Start checking items off this list. Anything you CAN do, relatively easily, should be handled right away so you can make progress towards a solution and have something to occupy your mind instead of worrying. Getting some things accomplished will help you feel relief right away.

7. REACH OUT – Share your burden with someone else. Maybe you talk to friends or family, or a therapist, or the blogosphere, but find someone to talk to about things. Sometimes just getting the thoughts out of your head makes them a little less daunting.

8. REVISIT LIST 2 – When you have completed all the items on List 1, take another look at List 2. By this point, some time has passed, and you may be calmer (better able to deal with the uncertainties). You may also notice that much of what you CAN do has been done, and there isn’t that much left to worry about. Now is the time to practice faith, trust, and patience. Sometimes we just have to wait. Breathe.

(I had items 9 and 10 on this list, but decided they didn’t add much value… and I’m not that obsessed with round numbers.)

What I’m missing now is the “What to do with toxic emotions once a crisis has been averted” part.

Two options I keep coming back to are:

9. Write – Sometimes I write in journals, or I post on the blog. Sometimes I furiously fill a page with all my rage, then rip it to pieces or set in on fire. These things tend to get the thoughts out of my head, but don’t actually solve anything. I am still left feeling… helpless.

10. Play – Many times when I am facing stressful conditions, I step away from them and immerse myself in Hunter’s world. Kids live in the present moment, and focus only on the things they are interested in. This serves as a lovely distraction, for a while, but it isn’t a long term solution.

But the thing is, when I’ve exhausted all of my coping mechanisms, there are some “issues” that remain… that will always be there, that I can do NOTHING about, but must learn to co-exist with. Some issues are hugely painful, terribly unfair, and not at all things I’ll ever be OK with… but, so what? Who ever said life would be fair?

Sometimes the things that stress us out don’t go away, and don’t get resolved, and never get better. What then?

I’m asking, really, because I don’t have a neat and tidy answer… obviously, or I probably wouldn’t have ended up in the doctor’s office. So now I want to know:

What do YOU do when life sits you in a corner, against a wall, and says, “On this particular issue, you will get NOTHING… and like it”? I mean, after crying, pouting, kicking and screaming… then what?

Thanks!!!

(Photo Credit)

Remaining Calm in Stressful Situations is a post from: Quest for Balance

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This is my son, Hunter, sitting on a boulder in the middle of a river, in my sister’s backyard in Costa Rica. I remember seeing him that day, thinking he looked sad, lonely, and bored. I had all but convinced myself that we should have waited to take our trip when his cousins were on vacation, so he’d have someone to play with.

I basically scolded myself and felt badly that, in my rush to get down there, I’d completely neglected his needs, and planned a trip that wasn’t going well for him at all.

Bad mommy.

Selfish mommy.

I could’ve done better.

But when I went over and asked him if he was bored or sad, he assured me he wasn’t at all. In fact, he was simply observing a line of ants, trying to get across a puddle, and he was trying to figure out how to build an ant bridge!

He was the opposite of bored; he was intrigued… fascinated… entertained… fully engaged in observing nature. That whole miserable scenario I was convinced of minutes before was entirely in my head. I noticed a few “clues” and filled in the blanks myself, creating an unhappy, fictitious narrative.

Why?

Recently, this sort of thing happened again. Hunter read The Little Prince on his own (we had read it together a few years ago). I asked him if he was sad about the end, when the snake killed the prince.

He thought I was kidding, and said, “Mommy! The snake didn’t kill the prince!”

I thought he wasn’t paying attention to what he was reading, but he WAS; it’s just that I know how to read between the lines. So I got the book to show him the sad scene, and highlighted the important clues:

*

Then I looked down toward the foot of the wall, and gave a great start! There, coiled in front of the little prince, was one of those yellow snakes that can kill you in thirty seconds. As I dug into my pocket for my revolver, I stepped back, but at the noise I made, the snake flowed over the sand like a trickling fountain, and without even hurrying, slipped away between the stones with a faint metallic sound.

I reached the wall just in time to catch my little prince in my arms, his face white as snow.

“What’s going on here? You’re talking to snakes now?”

I had loosened the yellow scarf he always wore. I had moistened his temples and made him drink some water. And now I didn’t dare ask him anything more. He gazed at me with a serious expression and put his arms around my neck. I felt his heart beating like a dying bird’s, when it’s been shot. He said to me:

“I’m glad you found what was the matter with your engine. Now you’ll be able to fly again…”

“How did you know?” I was just coming to tell him that I had been successful beyond all hope!

He didn’t answer my question; all he said was, “I’m leaving today, too.” And then, sadly, “It’s much further… It’s much more difficult.”

I realized that something extraordinary was happening. I was holding him in my arms like a little child, yet it seemed to me that he was dropping headlong into an abyss, and I could do nothing to hold him back.

His expression was very serious now, lost and remote. “I have your sheep. And I have the crate for it. And the muzzle…” And he smiled sadly.

I waited a long time. I could feel he was reviving a little. “Little fellow, you were frightened…” Of course he was frightened!

But he laughed a little. “I’ll be much more frightened tonight…”

Once again I felt chilled by the sense of something irreparable. And I realized I couldn’t bear the thought of never hearing that laugh again. For me it was like a spring of fresh water in the desert.

*

Every time I read this part, I cry like a baby. Or rather, I cry like a grown woman, who has lost loved ones and knows all too well how frail life can be.

I wish I could read it as he does, with no awareness of what is really happening… just enjoying the events of the story: prince talks to dangerous snake, snake goes away, prince and his friend are saying a sad farewell because the prince is going back to his planet, where he will be reunited with his rose (and live happily ever after).

THAT is how a child reads, taking everything at face value… not looking for innuendo, back story, sarcasm, irony, or making assumptions about anything. They read the words as they are written. Nowhere does it SAY, “the snake killed the prince.”

As grownups, we have learned the skill of INFERENCE.

According to Wikipedia, “inference is the process of drawing a conclusion by applying clues (of logic, statistics etc.) to observations or hypothesis; or by interpolating the next logical step in an intuited pattern.”

This is how we read between the lines. We see one thing written, but we INFER another. The mark of a true intellectual, right?

In fact, we do this in conversation, too. Someone tells us one thing, but we assume they mean another. We often suffer and agonize about what someone else “probably MEANT”, regardless of what they actually said, or did.

She gets upset if her guy wants to spend his weekends playing golf, or climbing mountains, because it CLEARLY means, he doesn’t love her! He gets frustrated when he asks her what’s wrong, and she says, “Nothing,” because OBVIOUSLY something is wrong… she has that pensive, sad, lonely, bored look (like Hunter had, on the river). We have mastered the skill of INFERENCE so that we can fill in the blanks in these, and other, complex situations.

We consider kids to be so simple and innocent because they are ignorant of the REAL, underlying meaning of things.

But are they?

What IS the “real” meaning of anything? How do we know what is “really” happening?

Maybe we (grownups) are over-complicating things by looking for hidden meaning in events that just ARE.

Maybe we could learn to simply enjoy our life story as a kid would, without looking for sinister sub-plots, or tragic endings. Perhaps this inference skill we worked so hard to master is actually undermining our ability to appreciate the happiness that is already present in our lives.

Without inference, the little prince (and you) could live happily ever after.

What do you think?

Do you read your life story AS IT IS WRITTEN? Or, do you fill in the blanks to your own detriment? Are you in the habit of automatically assuming the worst? Do you accept the words and actions of others at face value?

Thanks!!!

One Skill Undermines Your Quest for Happiness is a post from: Quest for Balance

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Recently I was thinking about how difficult it can be when we feel we need to hide our authentic self from others. We know deep down that the person everyone else sees is NOT who we are. We want them to see us, and love us, for who we truly are; but we dare not risk revealing the truth for fear of being rejected… of losing everything we love.

It suddenly dawned on me that my dear friend, Jamie, has lived most of his life this way, because he is gay in the Bible Belt. Being gay anywhere can be challenging; but being gay in ultra-conservative, intolerant towns can be downright dangerous.

I figured that couldn’t have been easy, and I wanted to ask him about it, but I was afraid of being too personal, or rude. I finally decided to do what kids do… when they wonder about something, they ask, and ask, and ask until they understand.

The only way we will ever learn to love and accept each other is if we first take the time to understand each other.

Jamie was kind enough to send me his story.

***

I always knew that I was gay, since I was really small. Of course, when you are small you don’t know what gay is, but looking back now, I realize it. I remember loving to watch The Dukes of Hazzard and Batman as a small kid and was very taken with Bo Duke and with Batman and Robin. I didn’t know how to explain it then, but I knew that I was attracted to them. As I got older, attraction to other guys intensified, and I realized that I was gay. I did not, however, accept it. I fought it very, very hard. I was ashamed, embarrassed, and afraid.

Growing up in the South, kids (and adults) are not exposed to a lot of diversity, and so all we know is stereotypes and what we are taught or hear from other people. I grew up in a very, very small, rural area on a mountain. The closest city was Chattanooga, 30 minutes away. I wasn’t exposed to much of anything except farmland and white people.  These people are very intolerant of anything that isn’t like them. Faggot was a word I heard thrown around as casually as the word Mama. If you were different in any way, people would focus on that and ridicule you.

Thankfully, I was able to hide my identity well.

I was a popular kid in school. I was the smart one, winning every achievement award possible in junior high. But I was also on the basketball team, and I had a good group of friends. The good grades and popularity followed me to high school, where I was valedictorian. I got some minor ribbing for being ‘smart’, but mostly respect. I dated girls, lots of girls. And I tried my hardest to be straight. I used to pray at night, “Please, God, let me wake up in the morning and not have these feelings about guys.”

I wanted so badly to be “normal.”

I don’t really believe in Heaven and Hell, so the fact that people would say that “faggots burn in Hell!” didn’t really have its intended effect on me. But I did think that being gay would destroy my life, that I would lose all my friends, that my family would hate me, that I would be physically abused. I couldn’t deal with any of that. So I hid. I wasn’t “nelly” or effeminate, so it wasn’t hard to hide. I had several girlfriends, had sex with girls, trying to be straight. Deep down I knew that it was all a lie that I would just have to learn to live with.

Even into college, I was still living the lie. I had gotten away from the rural area that I grew up in, but I was still in the South at The University of Alabama. And, I had gone with a good friend from high school along with many other acquaintances from the same area where I grew up. This didn’t help me feel like I could be any more of my real self.

I was still dating girls, though I definitely knew that I would never end up getting married (to a woman, anyway). Don’t get me wrong, I wasn’t miserable. I have great memories of childhood, adolescence, and early adulthood. The burden of carrying around a lie was heavy, but some days it was lighter than others. I just tried to focus on other things and spend as much time with friends as possible.

By the time I left that town, a year and a half later, I had accepted that I was gay, and I was just going to have to deal with things as they came. I had experienced my first “crush” and knew that I had never felt like that with a woman. It was, of course, on a straight man, but it did help me accept myself, so for that I am eternally grateful. I moved back close to where I grew up, but in the city. I took a job in Chattanooga, TN, and lived with some friends until I could pay off my student loans and afford to buy a place of my own.

My friend Marsha, with whom I was living at the time, was the first person I told. She said she already knew and was glad that I felt comfortable enough to tell her. There’s a long back-story with Marsha, but we won’t get into that. Let’s just say that she was happy for me, but devastated at the same time.

She started taking me to a gay bar in town. It was my first real exposure to gay life. It was there that I met my first boyfriend. Finally! All those hidden, pent-up feelings and emotions I had were being set free. I’d never been so happy to finally be myself and be in love! We were totally consumed with one another. He lived in Chattanooga, but worked all week in Atlanta. Eventually, we ended up in Atlanta, and I have been here ever since.

I told my mom and my sister that I was gay. Mom said she already knew, and that she was fine with it and she loved me. There was a caveat though. She didn’t want me to tell anyone else, no one else in the family. Not even my step-father. She said she didn’t want anyone treat me differently. Truth is, she didn’t want anyone to treat her differently.

She still lives in that rural community, and everybody knows everybody else’s business. She has to live in it, not me. So I respect that… I don’t agree with it, but I respect it. Even now, at 36, my step-father hasn’t been “officially” told. But my partner Tony goes home with me for Christmas, we own two houses together…believe me, he knows. And the rest of my family has just stopped asking the questions altogether.

They know.

Mike and I lived in Atlanta as a couple for 3 and half years. And while our relationship didn’t last, it was the push I needed to finally be able to live as a gay man. I was in a city that was accepting, a city where I didn’t feel like I had to hide anymore. I never have experienced any sort of physical or verbal abuse for being gay. I’ve never dealt with any kind of harassment at work, at school, anywhere. Not that it doesn’t happen, it just hasn’t happened to me.

I’ve been open about being gay, but I don’t announce it when I enter a room. If someone asks me if I’m married, or if I have a girlfriend, I tell the truth. It feels good to tell the truth and not care what the person on the other end of the conversation may think.

I assume that if I were more “obviously gay”, meaning more effeminate, that it might be a different story. People assume that I am straight. And that’s fine with me. I’m not one of those people who meets a stranger with “Hi, I’m Jamie. I’m gay.” I don’t have a rainbow flag sticker on my car. I’m just a regular guy, a normal person, who happens to like other regular guys.

*

What about YOU?

Have you felt the need to hide your authentic self? If you used to hide, and now feel free to be yourself, what is that like? Do you make it easy for others to be open with you about who they really are?

(Photo Credit)

Growing Up Gay in the Bible Belt is a post from: Quest for Balance

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Exactly a year ago, I published my very first post, How Many Souls On Board?

One of the early posts that really set the tone for my approach to life and my message to the world was, Choosing to See the Good. I became convinced that every life, every place, every job, every situation has positive and negative aspects, and that finding happiness depends on being able to choose the aspects we focus on.

I then started a Spirit of Adventure series on Monday mornings, to try to encourage readers to cultivate excitement in their lives, at any level. Great adventures, simple excursions, and a child-like view of the world can do wonders to spice up an otherwise dismal existence.

New friends came along and joined this nascent community; page views and comments increased; suddenly the blog had a life of its own! This concept fascinated me, enthralled me, captivated me, and I became a bit obsessed (is there such a thing?) I started watching stats, and worrying about trend lines, page rank, and seeking validation… “Which number tells me if they like my writing, if they like ME, if I am worth anything?!”

I was posting every day, and my emotions were ALL over the place. The self-imposed stress was starting to get to me, and then I did something a little bit crazy (in hindsight). I decided to turn off comments Tuesdays through Thursdays. Those were the days when I posted more personal stuff, the sort of posts that made me cry as I wrote them, and that I worried would not be well-received.

I needed a little space to find my balance once again… the balance between my real life and my new, unexpected, virtual life. Thankfully, Quest for Balance readers (you) understood and respected my need for a little breathing room. You stuck around, even through my quiet phase of introspection. You waited patiently, not judging me, while I sorted myself out.

One day, I had a big heart-to-heart talk with my blog.

I could breathe again.

Then my husband and I took a Giant Leap of Faith, leaving his corporate job (our only source of income) in search of a more authentic life. We had no idea what that would look like; we had no Plan B. It was exciting, and scary, and once again, YOU were supportive every step of the way. At one point things got so confusing, the blog went entirely silent for a while.

But you didn’t leave me.

You waited, and emailed, and checked on me, and gave me the strength to keep going.

For that, I THANK YOU, from the bottom of my heart.

Then it happened. I unloaded everything that was on my mind in a little rant I called The Passion Paradox, and everything changed. I started to see blogging, and people, and purpose in a whole new light. And I realized…

I can do some good in this world on my own, but together, we can make a HUGE difference.

When we cooperate and collaborate, across blogs, across borders, across all forms of communication, there is no limit to what we can do. I think it’s extremely important that we work together, get to know each other, and find ways to help each other get where we are going.

If I may ask, what troubles you?

When you read personal development blogs, or self-help books, what is it you seek? What do you struggle with the most? What currently keeps you from being happy?

My promise to you is, I will do everything I can to help you get through your challenges, or help you find the right person for the job.

This year is all about YOU, and how I can help you make life simple, enjoyable, and serenely balanced.

(Photo Credit)

An Anniversary, a Thank You, and a Promise is a post from: Quest for Balance

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