Reverb 10 - Day 28: ACHIEVE

December 28 – Achieve

What’s the thing you most want to achieve next year? How do you imagine you’ll feel when you get it? Free? Happy? Complete? Blissful? Write that feeling down. Then, brainstorm 10 things you can do, or 10 new thoughts you can think, in order to experience that feeling today. (Author: Tara Sophia Mohr)

I most want to achieve BALANCE in 2011. If I achieved balance, I would feel centered, I would feel all the things I need to feel when I feel them instead of having things get stuffed down and then pop up when I least expect it.

To experience that feeling today, I just have to do all the things I have been exploring this year and in this Reverb10 project.  Take baby steps, look at what I can eliminate, what I can add, how I am beautifully different, remember what is really important. I need to practice mindfulness, gratitude, art. I need to surround myself with people who support me in finding balance and avoid people who wish to tip the scales one way or the other.

For me, it isn't a discovery that I need balance. It isn't news - it is me deepening my self-investigation, digging further into the pieces of myself that I have glimpsed but maybe don't understand or haven't see in full, glorious, brilliant color. I need to dust some of me off, I need to dig some things out and I'm sure there are pieces that I haven't even discovered yet. That's kind of exciting.

{Future tool: Gretchen Rubin’s Start Your Own Happiness Project (and be sure to visit the Happiness Project Toolbox!). For the next 4 days as you round out your year, we’ll share one tool each day to help you plan your year ahead.}

Rethinking my 2011 Word and More Ordinary Joy

I'm wondering if Ordinary Joy is going to be my phrase for 2011...it is resonating with me...I'm seeing it, feeling it all around me. Earlier in the day, I had a hard time thinking of a list...now I am seeing all kinds of things, feeling them. Tears, chills, love bursting from my heart for a song, for a person I've never met...  all of this constitutes joy, doesn't it? I think so...

On the Kennedy Center Honors tonight, Oprah Winfrey was honored. I was moved to see her story, to see pictures of her grandmother, to see her beginnings as Miss Fire Prevention, to hear the funny stories, to see Sidney Poitier getting older (as we all do). Then, Jennifer Hudson came on and sang "I'm Here" from Oprah's musical "The Color Purple".  Not only is the performance stunning, as Jennifer Hudson always is, but the lyrics moved me to tears. A world view, a knowing that is deep and truthful and yearning for believers. I believe.


Lyrics: (they print musical lyrics in all caps in the scripts...)
I DON'T NEED YOU TO LOVE ME,
I DON'T NEED YOU TO LOVE.
I GOT . . .
I GOT . . .
I GOT MY SISTER.
I CAN FEEL HER NOW,
SHE MAY NOT BE HERE, BUT SHE STILL MINE.
I KNOW SHE STILL LOVE ME.
GOT MY CHILDREN.
I CAN'T HOLD THEM NOW,
THEY MAY NOT BE HERE, BUT THEY STILL MINE.
I HOPE THEY KNOW I STILL LOVE THEM.
GOT MY HOUSE.
IT STILL KEEP THE COLD OUT.
GOT MY CHAIR
WHEN MY BODY CAN'T HOLD OUT.
GOT MY HANDS
DOIN' GOOD LIKE THEY S'POSE TO,
SHOWIN' MY HEART
TO THE FOLKS THAT I'M CLOSE TO.
GOT MY EYES.
THOUGH THEY DON'T SEE AS FAR NOW,
THEY SEE MORE 'BOUT HOW THINGS
REALLY ARE NOW . . .
I'M GONNA TAKE A DEEP BREATH.
GONNA HOLD MY HEAD UP.
GONNA PUT MY SHOULDERS BACK,
AND LOOK YOU STRAIGHT IN THE EYE.
I'M GONNA FLIRT WITH SOMEBODY
WHEN THEY WALK BY.
I'M GONNA SING OUT . . .
SING OUT.
I BELIEVE I HAVE INSIDE OF ME
EVERYTHING THAT I NEED TO LIVE A BOUNTIFUL LIFE.
WITH ALL THE LOVE ALIVE IN ME
I'LL STAND AS TALL AS THE TALLEST TREE.
AND I'M
THANKFUL FOR EVERYDAY THAT I'M GIVEN,
BOTH THE EASY AND HARD ONES I'M LIVIN'.
BUT MOST OF ALL
I'M THANKFUL FOR
LOVING WHO I REALLY AM.
I'M BEAUTIFUL.
YES, I'M BEAUTIFUL,
AND I'M HERE.

[Source of information - www.angelrecords.com/colorpurple/lyrics.pdf]