Being a People Person

I recently had the pleasure of spending a few days with people I love and it made me realize a few things. First, I really am a people person. I am so much happier when I’m connected to people. And I don’t mean through social media. I mean the sitting in the same room kind of connected. We don’t even need to be talking to each other. We could each be reading different books or just sitting outside enjoying the weather or the view.

Second, being in the presence of another person brings you an emotional connection you cannot get through the internet. At least, I can’t. Being able to reach over and hold someone’s hand or hug or lean on each other. Really. Physically lean on each other. Try it. It can bring so much comfort or silliness depending on the mood. Watching someone as they turn their face into a warm breeze and breathe in the scent of the ocean brings a smile to my face.

Third, being with other people sometimes means embracing the chaos. Letting conversations swirl around you like fall leaves on the wind. Discussing the day, sharing things that make them smile, venting about whatever ridiculous thing aggravated them, or dissolving into peals of laughter. It means listening to others argue but not getting involved because you know it will resolve itself. Everyone has a different way of communicating and sometimes they clash.

Take a moment and watch the others around you. It makes my heart swell to see my family and friends interacting and enjoying themselves. Watching those that are watching others and thinking no one notices. The concern etched on faces of loved ones as they look after each other and the joy that stretches across those same faces when they see each other enter a room. Those small details that you cannot get through a screen. And while the screen serves a purpose when loved ones are miles away, I’m tired of it being the only form of connection.

I am a people person through and through. I would rather sit down and have a cup of tea and chat. Sitting outside in nice weather while having a conversation or taking a walk in the woods hold more pleasure than a phone call. Although, if I could actually have a quick phone call I would probably have more of those. I am the kind of person that enjoys listening to the stories of older people. The glimpses into the lives of others and hearing their hopes and dreams and the suspense they keep you in until you find out which became reality and which are still dreams.

People will always surprise me. They are not always what they first seem to be. I savor uncovering the layers of a person as you get to know them better. To do that, you have to put down your electronics and focus on that moment. Listen with intent. Connect with other people. For me, it keeps me afloat.

Fail (to fall short of success or achievement in something expected, attempted, desired, or approved)

I’ve been taking a deep, long look at myself lately. Trying to figure out who I really am and if that is who I still want to be. This type of introspection makes me look at specific moments and compare them to past moments. This is the way I do things now but 10 years ago, 25 years ago or 40 years ago I might have done the same thing differently.

Take cooking, for example.

People who know me today have heard of my many cooking and baking fails. I have set fire to many foods like garlic bread, steak, and chicken. The smoke from one particular Fathe’s Day barbecue was so bad that someone called the fire department. It was out by the time they arrived. And no, I did not go out and greet them to tell them it was my fault. My first recollection of setting food on fire was in high school when I was cooking a frozen hamburger in a pan on the stove top. The flames touched the ceiling. Safety Alert: Grease fires and water do not mix.

Baking has its own share of stories like the angel food cake that caught fire or the peanut butter cookies that called for a yellow cake mix. Lemon cake is yellow, right? I don’t suggest you try it. Successful baking usually included some kind of burn somewhere on my body. While I used oven mitts to take a pan out of the oven, when it hit my bare leg I still got burnt.
These are funny stories but they became THE story. I was not a good cook and an even worse baker. I failed at both. When I look back at other kitchen moments in my life, I enjoyed being in the kitchen with my mom and grandmom. The kitchen was where I heard family stories and attempted to learn family recipes. It’s a place of warmth and happiness in my memories. I’ve cooked hundreds, maybe thousands, of meals in my lifetime so far. And the successes outweigh the failures exponentially.

So why and how did this become MY story? So I failed a few times. The definition of fail says “to fall short.” It doesn’t say that you can’t do it. It just says that it didn’t work out THIS TIME. In this case, I allowed someone else to make my failures permanent. Why would I do that? Two reasons. First, he needed to be better than me. Second, when you hear something enough times, you begin to believe it. Until you don’t.

I’m taking back the things that I am good at. In the future, I will remember that failing at something is not the end. Any cook has stories of failures and they all end with “I’ll never ______ again!” For example, I will never in my life use lemon cake to make peanut butter cookies again. And neither should you.

Truth (the true or actual state of a matter)

It seems to me as I get older that truth is a matter of opinion. Some truths really are fact based but others are based on a person’s point of view. What I see as truth in a given situation may not be the same as the other three people involved. Especially if it concerns anyone’s feelings. Add emotion into the mix and all bets on finding a single truth are gone.

Why am I musing on such things? I started this blog in order to begin writing again. In the past, much of my writing was “secret.” Secret in the sense that only a select few would get to read it. As a teenager, I would leave poetry, notes, stories, etc. around the house as a way of communicating indirectly with my mother. I wrote for classes and myself. Precious few bits of my writing would end up in public for anyone to see. I still have in my possession several notebooks of things I wrote. They range from silly broken-hearted teenager stuff to very raw emotional rants. Each one held a bit of me from the moment it was written.

Today I struggle with writing because it’s very public – if you can find me. I’ve been posting erratically but I have several drafts saved. The last one I started is the one that led to this particular post because I want to understand my hesitation. My conclusion is that this hesitation is caused by fear. FEAR. Fear? Really?

Yes, really. If I let go of my tightly controlled hold on things and just put out there what is rolling around my head then things could change. People may not like what I write. What if my mother doesn’t like it? What if my 13-year-old daughter reads it? (We are heading into that “I hate my mother” phase.) What if my husband, who is no longer in love with me, reads it and it’s different from his truth? What if, what if, what if…

Never in my life have I spent so much time in the land of What If. I’m used to spending my time at the corner of What the Hell and Who Cares What They Think.

So, what if I decide to write my truth, my way and in my own time and not worry about “people” or fear? Maybe I’ll become a better writer. Maybe something I write will help and/or touch someone else. Maybe I’ll grow back into my own confidence. Hmmm…

Options (something that may be or is chosen; choice)

Options. It’s always nice to have them. It’s especially nice when you have to make hard decisions, to find that there are several options. The truth, for me, is that having the ability to make a choice makes me feel as if I have some control over my life.

When my life starts careening around odd corners and slipping toward the edge, I find comfort in weighing my options. I put everything down in charts and spreadsheets to see where I am, where I need to go and how the hell I’m going to get there. Then I will make small changes just to see how it will affect my choices.

Some may say I’m obsessive but I like to think I’m being thorough. I met with a professional on a subject that’s been of concern to me and found out that there was nothing surprising in what he had to say. That made feel good about my own methods of thinking things through. It didn’t change things dramatically but it did give me additional options to think about.

Each and every day we make choices big and small. I choose to make the ones that will have the positive impact.

Balance (a state of equilibrium)

Balance is a word that is being tossed around lately. Emotional balance, financial balance, work-life balance. What is this balance and does anyone really achieve it?

I find my emotional life very off-balance these days. I can go through my days pretty well for a good part of the week and then BAM! Some little thing takes my breath away and I’m off balance AGAIN. It’s usually unexpected. A song, a card or note, a picture, a phrase that someone uses in conversation. Nothing big or brash. Small, quiet, quick. A knife turning in the heart and days of walking on a balance beam trying not to fall off.

I have to admit that there are longer intervals between episodes. I even believe that they may become a yearly event instead of weekly. Of course, this is still a great improvement over the daily battle for balance I was facing nine months ago.

Even when I feel that I’ve achieved a precarious emotional balance, there’s still the rest of my life that is in the mix. How do I balance work, home, kids, family and just stuff? At work they like to talk about work-life balance. While listending to a podcase recently the person was saying that the phrase should really be work-life integration. I like that MUCH better. It actually seems more attainable than balance.

Balance suggests that there is equality between your work and your life. Reality suggests otherwise simply because you spend so much of your time at work, thinking about work and getting ready for work. Integration suggests that they can each work around and within each other. So instead of coming home exhausted and trying to make my grocery list, I can start it during work at a time that I need a mental break. That mental break will also give me a different prespective on whatever I was working.

And by the way, someone where in all of this I’m told that I need to find time for myself. Time to do things that I want to do. You know, like blogging. I do this so well, that I’m doing this at 10:30PM when normally I like to be in bed, lights out ready to sleep, no later than 9:30PM. I’ll pay for it tomorrow when 6:00AM rolls around and I’m feeling groggy.

Maybe I’ll try for balance again in a couple of days. Tomorrow will be an experiment in integration.

Whiskey in a Teacup

Life