Category Archives: Life

This past week in my Nia Dance class we were doing an incredible routine.

As we danced around the room, each completely moving our bodies freely.

Had you told me years ago that I would completely love freedancing?  I’d have thought you had to be kidding.  But its true.

I let go of control and just let my body move how ever it wants to, without forethought.

There we were dancing around the room and my teacher said.

“This is community”

She speaks of community in Nia often but somehow today it hit me differently.

This was community.  A room full of women moving their bodies freely and confidently (something that I’m sure for none of us came easily).

Dancing together in a room to beautiful music.  Feeling safe enough in each others presence to dance like no one is watching.

How beautiful is that?

It got me thinking further about the idea of community.

That there is no one way that it looks, feels, is.

Sometimes I hear about friends having hours long deep, connected, sacred phone chats with each other and I get it in my head that that is the way that community looks/feels/is and that if I’m not doing that, there is something wrong with me.

Which is so silly.

I’m an introverted leo (which means you may not be able to see my introversion when you meet me as I have the Leo social energy to me) but its true.  I need a lot of time alone.  I avoid the telephone if at all possible.  Something about skype makes it all so much better, to get to look someone in the eye.

But I simply know that I’m not the kind of person that can do those kind of chats every day, at this point in my life.

That doesn’t mean that I can’t have beautiful community.

There is no one way that community looks.

And whatever kind of community we crave, it is out there somewhere.

It may not look like what we expect either.  We don’t have to all be exactly the same or fit into a box.

It may be in an e-course with people from around the world.

It may be ordinary women coming together for a dance class.

It may be looking our neighbours in the eyes and saying good morning.

It may be found in moments of kindness.

It can centre around aspects of our identity or beliefs.

It can be that beautiful deep connection, which for me tends to work best in person, like at an art retreat or workshop.

It can be simple or powerful.

It can be creating together.

Let’s erase some of those stories of what we feel like community might be and the ways we are are outside of it.  Let’s rewrite a new story of community and open our eyes to it.

So, I’m running again.

Last year in January I started training for my very first race, which is a 10km (by the way, not barefoot running like the image might imply…just regular ol’ running).  I’ve been in love with running for a few years now (especially the way it clears my head) and had been doing a weekly clinic at a local running store. My clinic leader, a fabulous woman in her 70’s, lovingly informed me that it was time for me to move beyond the ‘Learn to Run’ clinic I’d been attending for a few years and that it was time for me to push myself further.

So I did.

I signed up for the clinic that seemed to be what I needed at that point, which was the ‘Learn to Run Faster’ training group for the Sun Run (a race here in Vancouver).  I fit the description (in writing) of who the clinic was for…those who already ran 3x a week at least 30 min, which was where I was at at that point.  So I signed up and started the clinic.

What I found was that in reality I didn’t at all fit into this group.  It seemed like it was an ‘I can already run fast but want to run faster group’ and it wasn’t right for me.  I stayed, as I felt I should push myself. I had a downright miserable time in this clinic (and I’m a bit of an optimist so it takes a lot to say that). Miserable, as in crying after many sessions.

But, no pain, no gain, right?

Wrong.

About halfway into the 13 week clinic I decided I could no longer take that group and moved to a ‘Learn to Run’ group.  It was a great group and I was far less miserable, and kept training.

Only 3 weeks until the race I ended up in extreme pain during a run with the clinic.  I hobbled home but it so happened that I was due to head to the states less than 12 hours later to help Liz out with the incredible Joy Retreat in Manzanita.

I had never experienced an injured bone before and thought it was just a bad pulled muscle, so headed out to the states (which meant I wasn’t going to get any medical care until I got back to Canada if at all possible).  I spent the next week in amazing company in one of my favourite places, the Oregon Coast, but also in pretty extreme pain at all times.

Once I got back home I finally got it checked out and found out that it was actually a stress fracture in my Tibia.

So, running had to be set aside as I healed.

I then moved, which brought me to a new neighbourhood far away from my beloved original running clinic (which I would have happily gone back to).

My new hood is fabulous and refreshingly absent of most chain or big box stores, full of lots of independant stores. That rocks, but it also has no running stores (which also tend to have amazing clinics run there).

I wanted to start running again, so hesitantly headed back to the Sun Run clinic (it is run at most community centres in the city).  This time I was in luck.  This clinic is amazing.

I had to start from the beginning (as in run 1 minute, walk 1 minute) again as I hadn’t been running much since the spring at all.

But starting from the beginning was a blessing.

We’ve been working up slowly, eventually getting to the distance that we could run 10km (which for me will be over an hour).  I have no time goals at all this year, just to make it to the race injury free and enjoy it.

Thats the thing that is so different this time.

I am downright happy, thoroughly enjoying it.

Last night we got to the point after 7 weeks of easing towards it, that the clinic takes a jump.  We now run 10 min stretches with a 1 minute break (x4) and then in the coming weeks we go further and further times until we can run the whole thing.

Something about running a 10 minute stretch at a time (rather than 1 or 2 or 3 or 5 min at a time) has me feeling like a runner again, mainly because when you are counting down the shorter lengths of time I find it is hard to get lost in the momentum and energy of running as I’m so conscious of the time.  Once we get past 5 minutes of any run, I just get into the groove and run run run.

I want running to be this.  Happy, energizing, head clearing, positive.

Not painful, stressful, pressure filled and miserable.

I’m grateful my leg healed up and I’m injury free again.  Grateful that this 34 year old body gets energized by running and is able to.

Grateful these two feet are on the move again.

Something happened last weekend that shifted my week majorly, in ways I didn’t expect it to.

I woke up Saturday morning, turned on my computer for a weekend full of work and noticed something was most definitely wrong with it.

I swiftly backed it up and headed out to the Mac Store for some advice.

It became clear that this wasn’t a little problem and mere hours later I found myself standing over my computer, removing its casing and installing a new hard drive.  Now, I sure can appreciate techno geekiness in others, but it really isn’t a skill I have so it was mighty scary to do it myself.

So here I am at the beginning of the week with an even longer to do list (as this consumed all my work time) but with a computer that has been, well, cleansed.  In order to not bring back the problem onto my new hard drive I’ve had to not just load it back up as it was but to bring back only the data and programs that are necessary.

This has been surprisingly fabulous.

My computer essentially had a cleanse, and like any physical cleanse, it makes things shift.

Somehow cleaning out all that clutter in my computer and whatever was creating some trouble, it took some of my brain clutter with it.

It took my gremlins and some not so nurturing computer distractions I’ve had.

As I sat down to work this week I felt clear and gremlin free.  What a treat, though it does make me even more aware of how most days of the year I’m sitting down to work swatting gremlins and self-doubt away like I was being swarmed by bees.

Mighty refreshing to have some respite from it.

Now, of course we can’t just clean out our computers like that all the time (and I know that it seriously sucks when this happen and we lose data or photos) but it was a really nice outcome of a bit of computer chaos!

Has this ever happened to you?  Getting rid of some chaos and mess (even if it isn’t fun) ends up giving you unexpected feelings of freedom?  I’d love to hear about it.