Honors the Light in You.

My yoga teacher has been on a bit of an affirmation kick this week, starting each class by encouraging us to silently take a minute and think about one or two unique personal attributes.  Before I go any further, a disclaimer: the yoga studio I go to is awesome and I love it but it falls more in the category of swanky rather than hippie.  Either/Or is fine and some people love one more than the other.  To me, my spot is the perfect blend of a good intense workout powered with the mental teachings and meditations that are a part of yoga.  And I never leave smelling like patchouli.

Now that we're clear that I don't want this written off as a total kumbaya moment in class, I'll get on with my point, my yoga teachers point.

It seems like, all too often, we are all too damn hard on ourselves.  I don't know why the negative thoughts can creep into our minds as fast or as easy as they can, I don't understand the moments when they decide to stick around and make themselves comfortable, egging on our biggest fears and worries, the ones lurking in the back of our brains.  And yet they do show up, they do hang out.  Well, eff them.  Because when you take a moment to really stop and think, we are all so much more than our insecurities and limitations.

For Lent this year, I decided to give up having a bad attitude.  This winter has been ridiculously hard on all of us in Boston and I felt like it was sucking my generally good-natured soul dry.  So I figured I'd try a little test, I'd flip this cold weather killing me slowly negativity around.  That doesn't mean I didn't get upset or angry or annoyed ever - far from it - but I tried, whenever a negative attitude felt like it was making its way into my mindset, to turn the tables.  Some days it worked.  Some days it didn't.  In the end though, I did notice a new and better habit forming.  Rather than sulk to work exhausted, grumpy, and tired of the endless snow, I tried to enjoy it.  Well...maybe enjoy it too strong of a word.  I tried to live it.  I forced myself to notice the ordinary moments, the ones that are actually extraordinarily lovely.  I made myself pay attention to how pretty certain houses looked on my walk to the T, how charming and quaint they were covered with snow.  I smiled as I listened to co-workers moan together about the cold, aware of the fact that we were all united in a collective this winter may kill us misery.  It didn't make the snow melt any faster or the T work any better but somehow, mentally, it helped.  Truly. 

There are a lot of factors I can't and will never be able to change.  But that doesn't mean I don't have a choice.  I can hate these things with a fiery passion and just be angry and walk around complaining all of the time.  Or.  Or I can take them for what they are and squeeze all the good I can out of them; use them for all that their worth.  Josh Ritter made a comment once in an interview years ago, one I've thought about often.  I am paraphrasing but he said "so much of life is in how you look at things.  You could go to a mall and think about how much the mall sucks and you hate it.  Or, you could look around that mall and notice a teenage girl going to get her ears pierced for the first time and what the means for her."

You take the bad, give it a long hard look, and then you walk away from it.  You pull the good where you can and then you leave the rest along the side of the road right where it belongs.   

At times, when our own unique traits get called out or recognized, I think the first response is to feel embarrassed. I know I have.  But then, usually, when I stop and think about that behavior of mine further I always realize this - it is mine.  Completely and totally a part of me, of what makes Kelli...Kelli.  And I like it that way.  You know how we teach little children to embrace their individuality?  We tell them they are all unique and beautiful and no two people are alike.  It seems like somewhere along the way as we grow into adulthood and the real world and responsibilities take over that we lose some of that empowerment.

Let's take it back.