Happy Halloween + making room for your darkness

October 31, 2014October 31, 2014 / Jill Winski / 2 Comments

Halloween has long been my favorite holiday, and fall my favorite season.

There is something about the fact that nature is in a beautiful process of going into a dormant state for the long winter months during the fall that reminds me that transitions are inevitable, and full of light and dark. And we need to honor them and make room for them.

Halloween reminds me to invite and bring awareness to any “dark” places within me.

I grew up believing I should be nice, upbeat, “positive.” Occasionally when I write fiction, I realize I’ve created a character who suffers from this “nice syndrome” (it’s usually a female character, but not always). It can be hard to create a juicy, complex story around a character like this unless I open her up and and take a good look around to find her dark places.

Once, in a writing class, I had a “nice” character write a letter to a friend. When I was finished with the letter, I read it aloud to the class.

“Well, what do you know?” my teacher said. “She’s not so nice after all.”

It turned out the character had a history in which she had done something she was very ashamed of, and she went around being “nice” in order to make up for this misdeed. Suddenly she was vulnerable, complex, and even a little bit dangerous. My story began to fly.

I love how my fiction serves as a metaphor for my life. My characters sometimes need what I need (or, they need exactly the opposite). When I feel “stuck” in life, it’s often because I’m not allowing anything I perceive as “dark” within myself to come to the surface and inform me about who I am and what I need. Dark and light must co-exist; in fact, one only exists because of the other.

So perhaps that is why I always relish and welcome Halloween, and why I have a penchant for horror movies. It all keeps me in touch with my own dark, my own creep factor.

On that note, Happy Halloween!

And: Today is the last day to sign up for one of my Mini Unsticky Sessions. Do you have a creative project you just can’t seem to move forward, or to start at all? You might want to try a Mini Unsticky. I will be retiring my Mini Unstickies after today, but you can still sign up through midnight Central Time tonight. Check them out here.

Good stuff this week:

I’m so pleased that Marianne Ingheim Rossi interviewed me about the power of journaling on her wonderful site, Journaling For Your Life. You can read the interview and explore her great posts, here.

I love this Halloween poem by “Monkey the Cat” at Cats at the Bar.

A few writers I know are on the fence about participating in NaNoWriMo. If that’s you, you may be helped by this post I wrote quite a while ago: “Are You Stretching or Pushing Yourself? How to Tell the Difference.”

On opportunities and trust

October 19, 2014December 15, 2014 / Jill Winski / 6 Comments

This past week, I almost signed up for a course that sounded really good to me. In fact, it sounded awesome and perfect. I know the creator of the course is amazing, and I’ve been wanting support in the area of the course material, and the pricing was just right.

It seemed like a no-brainer, but when it came to signing up, I was on the fence.

The deadline loomed and I couldn’t make up my mind. A part of me was convinced that if I didn’t take this course I’d regret it. And yet I couldn’t get myself to press the sign-up button.

I became really curious about what was going on for me here. I noticed that my mind was telling me it sounded great and it might be just what I needed and it was so inexpensive how could I not take it?

But when I dropped down from my mind, into my body, the idea of participating in the course felt heavy, even exhausting. It felt unnecessary. You don’t need it, my body said.

My mind started chattering, but … but … it has all these things you’ve been saying you need! It’s a chance for more learning, more connection, more growth! And it’s affordable! What’s wrong with you that you’re not signing up? The deadline, the deadline …

I dropped down into my body again, and got this message: We have enough learning, enough connection, enough growth for now. For right now, we have enough. Nothing more is needed.

I sat with this and I began to feel how supported I already am — even though my mind often tells me that I need “more support.”

As the deadline came and went, my mind did a wild, frantic dance. How can you pass up this opportunity? You must be mad. Mad, I tell you! You are going to regret this, bigtime!

The saner, quieter part of me sat and mused about all the noise my mind was making.

I saw my mind’s belief that the “right” opportunity only comes once, and that if I don’t grab it, I will be filled with regret. Forever.

I saw my mind’s belief that the “right” opportunity could totally transform my life. Forever.

I saw my mind’s belief that I need more of what I already have. Learning, connection, growth. Even if, at the moment, I feel “full.”

Then I thought about how the “true right” opportunities for me have usually had an organic feel to them. Like there was no decision to be made; the decision was making me, as Byron Katie might say.

When I am heavily on the fence, when there’s a forcing quality to a decision, usually the timing is not right — or perhaps I do not yet have enough information about the opportunity. Or, maybe, I just don’t need or want it.

Sometimes, it is difficult for me to say “I don’t want that.” And maybe even more difficult to say, “I don’t need it.”

But … what if I want it later? What if I need it later, and I don’t have it?

This comes up for me a lot when I decide to donate clothing or other things (which I’ve been doing a lot of this year). I’m convinced if I let something go, I’ll later regret that choice, or I’ll suddenly really need it and be without it.

What if that were to happen? What if I decide to let go of something and later realize I want it or need it? What then?

Can I tolerate the feeling of wanting? Of needing? Can I find alternative ways to meet that particular want or need?

(What more typically happens, at least with letting go of material things, is that I let go and never think of them again. This is not always so for other, more complex types of letting go.)

As for the course I decided not to take, my body is still fine with my decision, whereas from time to time over the past several days my mind has had a little fit — you should have signed up! What might you be missing out on?

The truth is, right now I don’t know exactly why my intuition (body wisdom) guided me away from this particular course. I may discover why later (maybe another opportunity that feels like a true YES will present itself). But, as I’ve written about before, intuition doesn’t always give us a reason. It simply knows. It’s trusting it that’s the tricky part.

And there’s something here, for me, about trusting that my needs will be met — sometimes, often, not in the exact way I think they will be, but they will be met. How many times do I consume more than I need because I am afraid that at some future point I will be deprived of what I need?

I think about the squirrels I see out and about all the time now, burying sustenance in the ground for the cold winter months. I’ve read that squirrels often forget where they bury things. I am like this, too, stocking up on things just in case and then forgetting.

What do you notice about trusting in your intuitive sense of what is enough for you? Is it difficult for you, too? I’d love it if you’d share, in the comments.

Image is “Squirrel with Peanut” © Kathy Davis | Dreamstime Stock Photos

Is it worth it? (and other helpful questions)

October 5, 2014December 15, 2014 / Jill Winski / 6 Comments

This morning I took one of my beautiful fall walks and noticed that my mind kept going to several things I’ve had on my to-do list for a long time that are just not getting done.

I stepped back a little and let my mind go — the practice of walking helps me immensely with getting into “observe my thoughts” mode — and pretty soon I saw that the thought that kept coming to the top of the rotation was this one: “What’s wrong with you that you’re not getting these things done? Anyone else would have gotten these things done months, years, ago.”

“What’s wrong with me?” is kind of a default, underlying, unhelpful thought for many of us. I’ve been a coach for about four years now, and I notice this particular thought come up at some point for most people.

There’s no satisfactory answer to this question. There’s no encouraging, supportive answer to this question. It’s a good example of a question that closes off possibility and keeps us spinning our wheels.

As I walked, and got out of my thoughts and into the present moment, noticing the row of trees that has erupted into lava-reds, the squirrels fighting for supremacy at the neighbor’s bird feeder, my mind began to get more peaceful.

And when I got home, I went to my journal (as I so often do), and experimented with better questions to ask myself about these things I am not getting done.

Why aren’t I getting them done? (“Why?” can be a good question, for sure, but in this case, it felt impossibly heavy.)

How do I want to feel about these things on my to-do list? (This created an instant feeling of lightness.)

What kind of relationship do I want to have with these things? (More lightness. Relief.)

Is it worth it to me to do these things? (Ahhh. Here I hit the jackpot.)

I could tell that last question was the one that opened up possibility and movement, because exploring it felt really juicy to me.

So I went through the list of these things that have been nagging at me, these things I’m not doing, and for each of them, I asked myself, “Is it worth it to me to do this thing?”

The answers were revealing. For the first thing on the list, the answer was a clear no. It simply wasn’t worth doing. But I was telling myself I needed to do it. Is it true I need to do it? No. I crossed it off the list.

For the second thing on the list, the answer was a clear yes. Yes, the thing is definitely worth doing. And here is where “why” comes in. It’s worth doing — good to know! — but I’ve gotten out of touch with WHY I want to do it. Time to reconnect with that.

With the third thing on my list, I realized I’m not sure if the thing is worth doing or not. Sometimes not being sure is code for “no”, but other times, there’s fear there that is masking the “yes.” So this one will require some inquiry, some investigation.

I feel so much lighter right now, like I’ve cleared a path before me.

What do you notice about the questions you’re asking yourself? Does your mind jump to “default questions” that may not be helpful, but you keep trying to act on them anyway? Try experimenting with finding some more helpful questions. And let me know how it goes.

Hope you are enjoying the changes that fall brings (both outer and inner) as much as I am.

And: My Mini Unsticky Sessions are half-price through Halloween, when I’ll be retiring them. My intention with these sessions is to help you make a quick shift that allows you to move forward on a project you’re feeling stuck on. I approach these sessions with a sense of curiosity and play, and they’re often a lot of fun. Check them out, here.