Just Who Will You Be: Living the Authentic You

Living an authentic life is difficult for anyone, but it is particularly difficult if being bright, sensitive, and intense sets you apart from your peers. Gifted students often feel the pressure to excel from either their own perfectionism or the perfectionism of their parents. They feel the pressure to rein in their extensive vocabularies when they are ridiculed by their classmates. They feel the pressure of the media that portrays gifted people as odd balls, geeks, pocket-protector-wearing nerds. They also feel the pressure when their test scores negatively impact the class curve for their classmates.

I recently read the book Just Who Will You Be? by Maria Shriver. She talks about the life-long pressures she felt to fulfill the expectations of others, to measure up to the accomplishments of a mother who founded the Special Olympics and a father who created the Peace Corps. Despite all of her own accomplishments as a journalist, after having to give up her career due to the possible impression of conflict of interest as the First Lady of California, Shriver felt she had lost her authentic self. Actually, she wasn’t sure she had ever known her authentic self.

This small book’s title has had a profound impact on my thinking. Just who am I? Just who will I be? As a professor of education, I work with wonderful people who have chosen to touch the future by teaching. This week I challenged my students to find their authentic selves and bring that authenticity to their classrooms. I asked them to reflect upon “Just Who Will You Be?” This is my personal reaction to that question:

Just Who Will I Be?
I will support and nourish the authentic me and allow her to exist in all aspects of my life. I will be a compassionate person who listens to the heart and words of others. I will be a family member who gives my love freely and without strings attached. I will be generous of my time and resources, but I will set appropriate limits to maintain my authentic self. I will search for little things in life that bring me joy. I will be a person who laughs easily and smiles frequently. I will practice mindful movements and mindful living.
Just who will I be? I will be a work-in-progress who is never quite complete but always growing and improving.

And just who will YOU be?

The Power of Synchronicity

I first became aware of my connection to birds after my brother’s death. Prior to that time, I never remembered seeing a woodpecker in our yard. A family of flickers began to appear shortly after my brother’s passing, and I am often surprised to be thinking about him only to look up and see a flicker in our tree.

My connection to birds expanded four years ago after the death of my mother. My mom and her best friend used to dye their hair red, so when these two red-headed downy woodpeckers appeared shortly after my mom’s passing, I took their arrival to be a gift from my mom. It gives me great comfort to see these woodpeckers on an almost weekly (if not daily) basis.

While struggling through the pain of a frozen shoulder, I went out to lunch with a friend, and we choose to sit outside under an umbrella. While we were having lunch, we were visited by a bird with an injured leg that he kept tucked tightly to his body. I was so fascinated by the fact that we were both injured on the right sides of our bodies, and I decided to nickname him “Armstrong” because that is how my arm would be one day. (My friend finds it quite curious that when we go to a local food court, a bird often flies in the building and hops around near us. She tells me that this never happens when she goes there with other friends.) I went home and told my husband about Armstrong and asked him if we could go back to see this bird, and sure enough shortly after we arrived the next day, he hopped over to our table.

After our 16 year-old black tuxedo cat died this year, we began being visited by a very large crow who always comes alone. She will create quite a racket until we acknowledge her presence, and then she is on her way.

Four years ago we scattered some of my mother’s ashes at a lovely site on the Oregon coast. Last week was the fourth anniversary of her death, so my husband and I decided to return to the spot to scatter more of her ashes. When we approached the area, a lone crow flew down on the rocks and began jumping up and down on a rock. It seemed odd that this crow would suddenly appear, and we laughed that it was our cat trying to get our attention. After scattering the ashes, I walked over to see what was near the rocks, and there was a bird, obviously at the end of its life. His eyes were still blinking, but he was unable to fly. I was struck by the synchronicity of coming upon a dying bird at the exact moment we were remembering my mother’s passing on another August 15th morning.

In an attempt to understand the significance of birds to both living and dying, I found a site on birds in mythology. This site indicates that birds play an important role throughout history and diverse cultures. In an explanation of birds and human souls it says: “Numerous myths have linked birds to the journeys undertaken by human souls after death. Sometimes a bird acts as a guide in the afterlife. In Syria, figures of eagles on tombs represent the guides that lead souls to heaven. The soul guide in Jewish tradition is a dove. In some cultures, it was thought that the soul, once freed from the body, took the form of a bird. The ancient Egyptians believed that the soul, the ba, could leave the dead body in the form of a bird, often a hawk. They built their graves and tombs with narrow shafts leading to the open air so that these birds could fly in and out, keeping watch on the body. The feather cloaks that Central American and Mexican priests and kings wore may have been connected to the idea of a soul journey.”

Perhaps I am just creating my own myth as a way to deal with the loss of significant people in my life, but I hope these beautiful winged creatures will continue to join me on my journey through life.

Mindful Movements – Mindful Living

Who would have guessed that my latest great book would have been a gift from my 93 year-old father. I begin every morning by warming up my body to the Stretching DVD by Bob Anderson. It is a great way for a sensitive and intense person to prepare her body for the day ahead. I have been quite interested in the power of breathing for maintaining a healthy body and had listened to tapes by Andrew Weil and Deepak Chopra, but I had never found a routine that became a part of my daily practice….that is until this week.

My father brought me a very sweet little book called Mindful Movements: Ten Exercises for Well-Being written by Thich Nhat Hanh and illustrated by Wietske Vriezen. The ten exercises aimed at connecting movement to breathing are clearly described and creatively illustrated. Included with this 59 page book is a DVD that leads you through each movement (all this for only $14.95). The beauty of these movements is that you become quite mindful of breathing in and out as you make each movement. In just three days, I realize that I am becoming more aware of my breathing throughout the day.

Have you ever heard someone suggest that you “just take a breath” in order to calm yourself down. Wouldn’t it be great if a regular part of our education would be to teach us to harness our breath as a way to maximize our potential? There are many sites on the internet speaking to the use of breathing to prevent and/or abort panic attacks. Teaching sensitive and intense children that breathing, rather than holding their breath, is a technique that is always available to them to help them calm down their nervous systems.

I am often asked about children who suck their thumbs, need their special blankets, or exhibit some other self-soothing behaviors. I was one of those kids who was still sucking her thumb at the age of ten, so I know the feeling of being a sensitive kid who tried to find a safe way to release my own internal tension. While I was embarrassed by the behavior and the resulting bump on my thumb, it was a sure-fire way to calm my nervous system. It is only recently that I have realized the power of mindful breathing and the ability to bring calm to my life. The beauty of mindful breathing is that it can be used when you are in line at the grocery store or when you are at a stoplight or a traffic jam. You can reframe these previously thought of inconveniences as an opportunity to practice mindful breathing.

My husband and I started this morning with the Mindful Movements DVD, and then we took our car for an oil change. We walked along the ponds being reclaimed as a natural habitat for wildlife, and were rewarded with being able to watch two beautiful grey heron in one of the ponds. There we were with another opportunity to experience mindful living. The author of Mindful Movements tells us of the seven miracles of mindfulness, and the first one “is to be present and able to touch deeply the miracles of life, like the blue sky, a flower, the smile of a child.” I will continue to nourish my sensitive and intense way of being by practicing mindful breathing and mindful living as my daily journey rather than as a mere detour.