The Stories We Tell Ourselves

 Happy Saturday friends!

A few months ago ManChild and I were out running an errand and we got onto 540 (outer loop around Raleigh, NC etc). When you're on an entrance ramp to a highway where the speed limit is 70mph, you speed up. He was picking up appropriate speed quickly and as we came around the curve to the highway, there were suddenly a line of tall thin "cones" (they aren't actual cones, they are 4' tall skinny orange tubes with a big rubber base, what are those called?) cutting the entrance ramp off and pushing us straight toward the highway itself with no on ramp at all. You know how everything in your brain accelerates to Mach 1 as you calculate your next step: No space. Big line of cars on the highway in the right lane going 70-80mph. No where to go. Slam into cones? Slam on breaks hard. Keep control of the car. Stop two feet from nose getting hit. 

All in a 19 year old brain that is not used to driving yet. No one was behind us so we sat for a moment and caught our breath before continuing on. Holy hell man, WTF. Whose bright idea was that? No signs, no flashing lights, no warning in any way. Idiots. 

We spent the rest of the drive talking about how he did everything right. 

Fast forward to earlier this week when ManChild mentioned that story and how he totally freaked out. 

Huh. Isn't it interesting the stories we tell ourselves? He absolutely did not freak out. So, I told him, 

"Actually that's not true."

He stopped and looked at me.

"You did absolutely everything right in that situation. You kept control of the car, you stopped in time. There wasn't anything that could have been done that would have been better than what you did. You were exactly right. I was really proud of you, I still am!"

He continued to look at me, I suppose making those same quick decisions, and said, "Thank you for saying that." 

Somehow he took what I was saying as truth, adjusted his belief about the situation and reframed his story. Shocking in a full grown adult, let alone a teenager. 

I hate those stories that we tell ourselves about how we freaked out, we weren't good enough, we aren't capable, when the sheer fact that we are still standing here, proves otherwise.

THE RANCH 

I did the thing, whoohoo! For a long time, I've been this little business and have just done payments using Venmo, Zelle, cash/check. Now I have this Monday night online art class on Zoom, every Monday from 7:30-9pmET. I want this part to grow so I made it easy for women to sign up, you can pay right from my webpage and use Apple Pay, Google Pay, and credit cards, yay! So much easier! So, if you've thought about it but payment was fussy, please consider again! And if you know someone who might want to join, please forward this email or this site to them.

••• 

The Portal to Another Dimension Chandelier is up for grabs! This is the chandelier that was very pretty in this house when the previous owners lived here but not pretty with my stuff :-) In the early days of us being here and sitting under this chandelier, my brother looked up and said, "It's like a portal to another dimension."

Yes! Can you hear it? As soon as you sit down you hear whoom, whoom, whoom and if you lean forward to grab the butter, the sound gets faster and louder and pretty soon you're sucked into it, butter in hand, to who knows where. 

Here are a few pics of it from the day that we looked at the house back in March of 2021. If you've been here before you'll recognize the floors pre-2025 fire. They are the same floors but after the fire we had them stained to look like white oak instead of the red oak they are. You can see the chandelier off to the left in their dining room:

 

I loved the previous owner's style, that baby grand at the entry was beautiful! I love rugs too but lost all mine in the fire. They "cleaned" them for me and they came back smelling like sweet smelling chemicals. That was not going to work for this sensitive girl. Sigh. Back to square one.

So, the chandelier is yours if you want it, free! I hope it goes to someone who loves it :-) Send me an email if you'd like it. You have to be local-ish (I'm in Apex, NC), it's heavy and I'm not going to be shipping it.

Here's what I know about it:

Dimensions:
 • Outer ring: 30” diameter
 • Inner ring: 20” diameter
 • Drop: 29” from ceiling (adjustable longer – extra cable inside ceiling mount)

Features:
 • Heavy, dual floating rings with glass crystals
 • Crystals on both inside and outside of each ring
 • Bright, white integrated LED lighting 
 • Chrome finish with mirrored inner surface for extra sparkle
 • Sleek cable suspension – no bulky rods

Condition:
 • Excellent gently-used condition
 • Fully functional, uninstalled and ready to take home
 • Includes ceiling mount and hanging wires
 • Clean and carefully stored

And here you can see why it didn't fit my house :-) Our eat in kitchen is more than big enough for a good sized dinner party and I don't have a completely separate work space like I did on the Colorado farm. So our formal dining room is no longer and is used for my weekly Women's Circles. Weather permitting, we head out to the lower pasture to have our meditation and circle with the ponies and mini donkeys and then back inside for art and laughter:

 •••

Yep, yep, teeth showing a bit, a few frown lines that life gave, maybe clutching a little bouquet of weedy wildflowers but it's okay, the ones who actually receive it and say, "Oh look! Positivity! Let's go this way!" also look a lot like this. So basically we are a bunch of happy, feral raccoons over here in the Women's Circles and we pretty much like it that way :-) 

And speaking of Women's Circles and what we offer each other, I saw this great quote from Awakening Body that said: "Every woman needs at least one friend she can have the most inappropriate, absolutely unhinged conversations with and never once worry about being judged. I'm pretty sure it's essential for our mental health."

THE RANCH:

Sweet little Blu, having a rester in the sun because you know, it's not one million degrees anymore (his foot is all better!): 

Brad was working on the bubbler in the pond (helps to keep the pond from getting gross) and was digging down into our sandy soil on the other side of the dam. He accidentally uncovered a turtle nest! There were 10 baby turtles inside, the size of silver dollars (or an Oreo to you youngins who have never seen a silver dollar :-))

And now we can see first hand why our neighbor (the one with the larger pond) had to have her dam fixed! Ugh.

•••

I started the Great Plant Migration back into the house about a month ago and brought in all the big ones. I kept getting the feeling that there was a green anole in the house. Every time I would feel that, my brain did that "that's not true" thing that makes us doubt our intuition. 

Heehee. 

Never discount your intuition:

We opened the window to see if it would hop out but it was very happy sunning itself, thank you very much:

Brad got a cup and paper, cup on the left of the anole, paper around the lamp on the right. It jumped right onto his arm. He said he could just barely feel it's little tiny nails:

He tipped his arm out the window and it hopped out. Success! While I really wouldn't mind a cute little green anole in the house, I was worried about it not having enough to eat!

•••

Have you seen a mane braid like this? If you can French braid, you can do this one too. It's like a half a French braid. Next time I'll change it a bit so I can gather all his wither (shoulder) hairs in too. He was so good during our Tuesday circle this week. After our check in we were just chatting and enjoying the horses before we went in for art and Blu stayed very still and let me pretend I was five years old again. Now he needs some mane chalk for some pretty streaks and maybe some hoof glitter ;-)

HOW TO WORK WITH ME

Equine Partnered Coaching! With horses, without horses, phone, or online, your choice. 

Neurofeedback Train your brain to calm and ease. The most common response I hear about neurofeedback is, "I'm so much less reactive in my life!" It really does smooth out the sharp spikes. Super helpful if your world feels harsh and spiky right now. These appointments are in my climate controlled office.

Reiki Another way to facilitate relaxation, calm, healing. If the weather is nice, you can choose outside in the herd or of course, in my office is always available :-)

And Women's Circles! I've updated my website yet again so read up and then contact me if you want to talk about joining a Women's Circle!

Wednesday Women's Circle has a waiting list, I will add you to it if you'd like. Newer people do indeed get in occasionally, as sometimes the people higher on the list end up with upcoming vacations, too busy at work, or just life is life-ing. 

Tuesday Women's Circle, runs 11am-2pm,  contact  me if you're interested in the next group, it starts October 26th.

Monday online art class via Zoom. Ongoing, every Monday, 7:30-9pmET. $35
I teach you something fun in watercolor or mixed media. It's a low key, jammies kind of class. Right now it's still small so you get more one on one instruction if you want it. 

 

All of my art and writing is made with human intelligence!

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