Where Hope Resides

It’s hard to believe it’s the start of August and that Greg went back to school yesterday. I’m always reminded, as we head toward fall, that September is the month we put extra effort into suicide prevention with National Suicide Prevention Month and World Suicide Prevention Day.

But there have also been some deaths lately, a death here in New Mexico that no one is saying is a suicide unless one reads between the lines and the death of Sinead O’Connor who couldn’t seem to find peace in herself and then the suicide of her son that made it even more challenging.

All this together started me thinking on what my message September is this year and I realized it’s going to be much different than usual although not a new message for me.

It’s about where we find hope.

I don’t know why, but so often my head the phrase, “where hope resides” travels through and it did last week as I contemplated these deaths and the emotional pain that these people- and so many others– feel.

Life feels so much more challenging these days than ever before- we remain divided and angry. There has been change that makes sense to some and not to others. Even going to a restaurant has come to feel like a chore when you don’t know if they have enough staff to feed you (another topic for another day). Sometimes finding joy feels sucked away with the vacuum cleaner in this change.

When I find myself getting down, the question comes floating through– where does hope reside? In some way, it does in this photo of sunrise in the rice fields in Ubud, Bali. A new day always means a new start. And no matter how difficult the day before was! There is something about darkness giving way to light. After all, it can’t stay dark forever, the sun has to come back.

Perhaps instead of a message this year, a statement of inspiration, I’m issuing my own challenge to everyone (a good challenge, I’d like to think!): where does your hope reside?

Harnessing Fear

It has taken me a long time to make friends with fear. And I admit there are some days that I really struggle with it.

I don’t know what has created the fears I have of a variety of things. I do know that somewhere I along my life path I had to learn to embrace it because it wasn’t going anywhere. Probably what helped me the most was running competitively because it was there that I had to learn to push myself. This didn’t always go so well, however, I can say that I learned so many of the skills that I parlayed into everything else I have accomplished.

After all, we need to skills that we build– much like building blocks– to get better, to learn, to move forward. We have to start somewhere and then we keep adding, the blocks getting higher, not making a hard wall to climb but making a wall of skills we can use.

The caveat in all this is that it’s so easy to let fear get the best of us. Believe me, I know this well. And it’s the disappointment– repeated many times– that finally taught me I didn’t want to feel that way again. But that also meant I had to teach myself how to overcome it.

Self talk, taking little steps, setting small goals, were all part of embracing fear. And reminding myself that if we break it down, fear is simply not knowing what’s going to happen.

While for multiple reasons I can’t surf at this point in my life (although I am hopeful I will be able to again), surfing taught me a lot about forging past fear. The first time I got on a surfboard was one of the most intimidating things had done. After all, me of all people surfing? But I did it. I was never very good at it but I kept trying, kept reminding myself to be respectful of Mother Nature or she’ll teach you a lesson (she taught me a significant one once when I allowed the wave to get between my surfboard and me and the board walloped me in the face).

Even though I can’t surf now, I use what surfing taught me to do other things in my life as I build Chelle Summer, as I write more books and market them, wanting people to read them and enjoy them. We all have fear, but the key is, how can we use it to help us go forward?

How I Finished Writing "Route 66 Dreams"

I don’t often talk about it, but when I was four years old, I had eye surgery to tighten the muscle in my right eye. The surgery went well, however, it turned out I was allergic to anesthesia and I have horrible memories of my hospital stay because I was miserable.

It took me a long time to realize how that experience, despite the fact that my maternal grandfather was a doctor and I was raised around medicine, left me fearful of hospitals.

Four years ago, I had surgery to remove my uterus because fibroids that had been removed once before came back. It was absolutely worth it, but for those three weeks prior to the surgery, I found myself more scared than I was willing to admit because of one thing– I had to spend the night in the hospital.

While I knew I’d be okay, I also had this fear I’d been carrying around with me for all these years and I was always proud of myself for managing not to have a hospital stay. Before the surgery though, I had to find some way to cope, some way to make the most of those three weeks rather than sitting around and dreaming up all the bad things that could happen.

First, I set to work and finished recovering the outdoor patio cushions I’d been working on. Then I realized I also needed to finish the manuscript I was writing– get the rough draft finished so I could put it away. I devoted more time to Route 66 Dreams in those three weeks and also to the research I needed to do at the library because it took place in 1986 (the 1986 newspapers weren’t available online and instead I had to take a trip to the university library and then one of the city libraries for the microfilm).

It wasn’t easy but I found it was a good way to train my brain. Instead of ruminating about my unfounded fears regarding surgery, I had to keep my head on the Danielson family road trip that I was writing about. When I showed up for surgery that June 1 morning, I had put them away for a while, giving myself distance from the manuscript while I also needed the time to recover from the surgery.

I was still scared, but at least I hadn’t spent three weeks staring at the ceiling, playing all the loops of what might happen. Instead, I learned a lot in that time while also facing one of my biggest fears. And I created something I’m proud to say is mine.

The Olympics

I suppose it was just as well I was out of the room when they exintinguished the torch on the taped version of the closing ceremonies last night. My hope is that in two years, in time for the next games (summer), things will be different in a better way.

My sister Karen, Greg, and I all lamented how we weren’t excited for the Olympics a few weeks ago. I can’t speak for Greg, but for Karen and I, the games were a big deal in our family. I can recall all of us gathered in front of the tv to watch bobsled and figure skating in 1980 at Lake Placid and then track in the summer of 1984 in Los Angeles.

For the past year or so, I’ve been spending more time tracing back in my life where my dreams were born and what inspires me. In a major way, it has been the Olympics. It’s where my unfulfilled running dreams were born, but those dreams taught me about goal setting, dreaming big, working hard, and the idea that we can achieve something we set out to do (although my case it was a long list of things outside of running competitively, but I don’t believe I would have accomplished any of it without dreaming about winning that goal medal in track).

Denise and I watched a lot of Olympics together and in the late 1980s when Mom worked for Midway Airlines, she took us to Colorado Springs to see the United States Olympic Training Center, a place I would spend the summer working as an intern at USA Boxing the summer of 1993, just months after Denise’ suicide.

That summer put me in the thick of our athletes, especially in the cafeteria where we all ate (Bonnie Blair sat behind me one day). I worked the 1996 Atlanta summer games and in 2002, I carried the torch here in Albuquerque as the flame made its way to Salt Lake City.

The Olympic games are a part of the fabric that I continue to weave and call my life. I am saddened by a whole slew of things that have happened, of knowing how many people aren’t excited by them (we found ourselves getting more into them as the eighteen days wore on), and I hope that the changes that need to be made can be made to make them stronger and change them as our society has changed much in recently years. We are in a reckoning with so much and the Olympics are no exception.

Probably what saddened me the most though, was the comment in an article about how much NBC paid for the games, saying how they one had been something that brought us together. That wasn’t the case at all this year, like so many other things.

Still, I hope that in 2024, the rings that have been separated will be glued together stronger than ever. After all, how many other dreams were born through the Olympics besides mine? I hate to imagine life without something that has made such a difference for so many of us.

Breaking the Loop

The loop. We all have at least one– maybe more than one, maybe more than we want to count. The loops that repeat in our heads over and over about how we feel about ourselves, about something we regret we did or said, how we think others see us. They can be endless while sending us into a downward spiral that paralyzes us.

Yes, those loops.

Those are the kind of loops that are meant to be broken. They don’t do us any good so why do we hang onto them other than we’re just so accustomed to them that they are a habit, the kind of habit that needs to be broken.

It takes a little work– I won’t deny it, I’ve spent years cutting my loops and throwing them in the Wednesday trash pick up. But once you learn how to break the loops, you become more aware of them and can stop them before they paralyze you.

The key is finding a way that works for you to stop them so you can break them. In fact, the universe might be trying to break them for you and you just don’t realize it (that phone call or text message that comes through while you’re looping? It’s probably there to help get you out of your head).

For me, I’ve learned to distract myself from the loop. The loop is negative and I know it, but I also know how hard it is to stop myself from the negative fearful thinking that ruled so much of my life. If I’m looping. I force myself to think of something happy and that means switching my mind to thinking about whatever writing project I’m working on or something that I’m sewing. Maybe even a drawing/painting that I’m not quite sure how to get onto paper.

This happened recently– I caught myself in the loop and then moved my thinking to what I was going to write the next day in the latest novel I’m writing. What would happen next in the story? What pieces was I missing? Where was I stuck that I need help to change or make happen?

I found that I instantly felt better and the loop had been thrown in the trash. Sure, the loops keeps trying to come back, pesky things that they are, but I keep breaking them. And the best part? It’s actually forcing me to spend more of my mind and time being creative. I've come to realize how much time I’ve wasted thinking about things that don’t deserve the loop.

Keep Looking Up– and Ahead

This is how this morning felt– like there was an endless staircase, only going up, ahead of me. I didn’t really want to run or swim or tackle the long list that awaits me. It’s January and, while I continue to step forward in my life, it’s a lot of work to keep my feet going forward rather than stopping when it feels like this month could be more endless than usual (why can’t it be 28 days like February?).

The losses keep coming– so many deaths, not many from COVID in my life, but from other causes or people who are, well, old and it’s their time to move on. I have the sense that many people aren’t supposed to travel with us in our different world.

We have all changed. The world has changed. I heard a quote yesterday that said, “We have to figure out how to stitch our past to our future.” We have to weave them together without many loved ones, without familiar routines that we miss, and the pieces of our lives we thought would always be there for us. While this virus feels endless, it will end, but everything will not be the same.

We have to find how to make it with this “new” world and “new” life. We need to find our happiness in new things while we’re still grieving all that we have lost. Obviously, seeing how people are struggling to cope, this isn’t an easy task. However, our focus should be on making do with the new rather than continuing to look back at what was and what won’t be again.

We all have choices. We can stay where we are, stuck and unhappy. Or we can grin and bear the discomfort and find a new path ahead of us. What we can’t always see is how great a new path can be. But we must take those first steps to find out.

Our Lady of Guadalupe

While I didn’t get to to mention it yesterday on social media, my birthday is really about the Feast Day for Our Lady of Guadalupe.

I had some birthdays along the way that were awful for a variety of reasons. I wasn’t aware of the significance of Guadalupe until I came to New Mexico and slowly found her becoming part of my life. When I’m at church– even in another town or state where there might be a Guadalupe statue (because I travel mostly between New Mexico and California where she is part of the culture), I will light a candle and say a prayer to her.

I always ask her to guide and lead me, to help me with my writing, and to make sure I do the things I’m supposed to do. I believe life has larger, more significant things for me to do and I don’t want to miss them.

The inspiration is coming fast and furious and I’m holding on during the holidays, hoping I can harness it when everything quiets down in January. I’m starting to realize that it’s like Guadalupe is constantly whispering in my ears ideas and bringing me inspiration.

Yesterday, however, the day that we share, was about honoring the last year, the prayers, the inspirations, the accomplishments. While I continue to be inspired, it is important to take that day, that step back, and acknowledge all that’s happened. With her in my life, my birthday has become a more meaningful and spiritual day.

I did that with mass in the morning and a small dinner party with some of the more spiritual people in my life, especially Veronica who is from Mexico and knows more about Guadalupe than I ever will.

Thank you, Guadalupe. I look forward to what we’ll do in the year ahead with you continuing to lead me.

Positive Self Talk

When I started running when I was twelve, I had no idea there was a mental side to training. Quite honestly, I thought you pretty much just went out and ran as hard as you could, pushing yourself as much as you could, that it was all about your physical body and nothing else.

But I was lucky to be quickly introduced then and through my teen years to things like self talk and how much running is about telling yourself you can do it, you can push yourself to run faster, longer. And how you learn to let go of whatever else is distracting you, bothering you so that you can keep your focus on the race. It was about learning to let go of everything that had happened at school that day (and/or at home) and “staying the course” as it was often called.

I’ll be honest and say it took me a long time to master these skills and I still haven’t in many ways. However, I do know that I use them daily to push myself to accomplish whatever tasks are ahead of me and to keep me moving forward when sometimes it feels like it would be easier to sleep in, lounge on the couch, to give up.

Last week here in Albuquerque we had wind. Then we had more wind. and yet more wind. One would have thought it was spring with all the wind we had. I woke up at 4:00 am as I usually do and the last thing I wanted to do was go run in that wind. And then swim in the wind (the gym where I swim has an outdoor heated pool).

That’s when the self talk started. First I had to get myself out the door into the cold and wind with Lilly. Then when I returned home, it was Ash’s turn for his run. And, finally, my run without the dogs.

I patted myself on the back but I still had to get myself to the pool.

I always say that I run because I can do it out the front door– if I went to the gym to run I’m not sure I would ever have developed the routine that I have. It’s hard to get in the cold car and drive to the gym. But I kept reminding myself that I could do it, that I had swum in worse conditions. And that when I was done, how happy I’d be that I’d accomplished the full workout in less than ideal conditions.

The wind made the water feel a little cool; I used that as incentive to swim faster. I tried to think of other things to make the time pass and somehow I made it to my 1,150 yards and climbed out of the pool, knowing I could stay inside the rest of the day if I wanted to.

It wasn’t easy, but each time I do this kind of workout, it makes it easier the next time I’m faced with a challenge. I don’t know that any of us ever master positive self talk but I know it’s helped me accomplish a lot more in my life than if I hadn’t had those lessons. I was lucky to have them early.

Home

I don’t believe I can ever write enough about the importance of home because I don’t believe many people understand how important home is related to who we are/who we become. And the choices we have about making home a place that makes us happy.

While I understand that life isn’t about physical objects so much as it is about what happens inside our minds, nourishing all sides of ourselves, home is our shelter, our rest, our inspiration. Home is a place where we live the routine moments of life that make up more than the big events.

Someone taught me long ago that you sow your seeds where you are planted, that no matter where you are, you make the most of it. Her words have always echoed in the back of my mind, even when life wasn’t what I wanted or that I wasn’t really where I wanted to be. Still, it was important to take care of home.

And it’s why I spend the time making changes, updates, surrounding myself with what makes me happy. I love to explore the world, but I also love to come home and just be.

Watching the pandemic play out, I saw many people who realized that home wasn’t necessarily what they wanted it to be so they made changes. Others chose not to. To me, it was an opportunity to make home better because that bodes well for the future, especially for the others who share that home with you. It might not be obvious, but you’re giving something to them, too– a piece of yourself.

Lenten Journey 2020

I have written on social media recently that I feel like I am on a journey of crossing a murky lake, much like the one in the photo above. While we have been taught that Lent is about crossing a desert, for me, this year it’s about the murky lake.

I’ve been crossing the desert for years for Lent and in other times of my life and this year I felt the need to change things up. While I always feel that Jesus, Our Lady of Guadalupe, Saint Rita, and Saint Monica travel with me, this time they are in a boat rowing alongside of me, cheering me on, helping me to see the way to the shore ahead.

And for many years I wrote here that I felt I needed to put more effort into letting go at Lent although that changed a few years ago. I’m not saying I’m good at letting go (excuse me while I fall off the ball I sit on and laugh on a few minutes), but I needed to do something different. The last few years it’s been about working steadily on a writing project during Lent.

Part of this stems from the fact that the writing, sewing, and creating are coming at me strong and it’s hard to keep things in check and make sure that I stay focused and complete things, not just start them and move on. There are several unfinished writing projects and my thought was that if I keep my focus on one during Lent, keeping my nose to the grindstone and staying the course, the goal is to have the rough draft completed by Easter.

It sounds easy and the first week or so, once I get started, isn’t so hard.

But the hard part comes a few weeks in when other ideas creep into my head, I get distracted wanting to do other things. It’s at that time that I want to climb into the boat, dry off, and not work so hard for a while. Ah! But that’s the third lap of the four-lap (1600-meter) race around the track, the lap when you need to work the hardest to bring you momentum for the final lap.

That’s when the Lenten Journey gets tested. Can I do this? The finish line isn’t that far away, but just far enough away that I can’t see it.

Here I am, work having started slowly, talking myself up, and getting ready for what will be worth it come Easter: a completed rough draft of another novel.

There is something to be said about the reminder that we should take this journey each year. For me, it makes me stronger and reminds me that I can do it. And I’ll be even stronger next year.

When the Journey Isn't Clear

I have to laugh. I couldn't think of a topic for this week because my life is very quiet right now. I realize that isn't a bad thing but I'm a person who is used to many irons in the fire and running from place to place. I know this time is a gift to write and create– which is what I'm doing– but it seems like many times I have written over the years about what it's like to not feel as if the journey is completely clear.

I have been at many points in my life where I felt complete clarity of the journey but doing things like working on a degree or writing a book with someone else gives you smaller goals along the way because you're not on that journey alone.

This time is different though. After I finish this blog, I will go and write a few pages on a manuscript I've started and then I have a slew of aprons to finish that I had cut out some time ago. While a few of them are custom orders, most of them don't have "homes" yet (translation– they haven't been sold) and I don't know if any will when I post them later in the week. 

So it's a strange place to be– I am working hard, I am making things happen...but yet I don't know what the end result will be. However, I do believe I am on the right road, even if that road doesn't always feel so defined or that I'm following someone else's directions (like in the photo attached). 

Life usually isn't spelled out for us, especially when we choose undefined roads. And even though we aren't always sure how we'll get there, we know the journey will be worth it when we arrive.

A New Year...Where Will We Go?

Happy 2018, Everyone!

While I believe that we can start fresh at anytime, there is something to be said for the calendar rolling around into January 1. We come off the holidays– when we've most likely been busy– and then we get (I hope you did!) a holiday break. The new year rolls around and suddenly it feels like all the Christmas lights and decorations should be put away until at least Thanksgiving. Personally, I usually want to clean out all of my closets this time of year. I feel as if it's time to let go of the old to invite the new to come in.

This year is starting out a little differently than years past have and I'm embracing the journey of my job going half time to free up a large chunk of my daily time. However, we were in Los Angeles for the new year (and managed to get colds as happens sometimes) so I didn't feel like I could truly start the new year until we came home– and put everything away (although we had taken care of the Christmas decorations before we left).

For me, Los Angeles still remains a very inspirational place. I can't explain it except that it seems that I woke up one day when I was about thirteen and knew it was where I wanted to go. I didn't get there until the summer after I graduated from high school and obviously I never moved there. I joke that I only got as far as Albuquerque. 

Through a series of events, I've been given opportunities that take me back there and as we were driving down the 110 after having dinner with friends in North Hollywood, I was thinking how it still inspires me to be there. That's topped with the many signs of both my parents (through songs on the radio and coins) that don't usually happen here in Albuquerque.

Now that I'm home and everything is put away, the lists made to make the most of this opportunity of time I have been given with job going half time just a month ago, the hardest part for me is being patient with myself. There is much I want to do and I know my timeline. My hope is to spend 2018 with my nose to the grindstone and see what kind of opportunities I can create for myself through all my creative means. I want to take advantage of the time placed in front of me– it is a gift– and see where I land a year from now.

I have lists, goals, and dreams. The key is being patient with myself that there will be enough time to do everything, to know that I will land where I'm supposed to be. And to listen to voices which who are guiding me and leading the way.

Be Fearless

While I don't know why, I have let fear drive much of my life. I can see it when I travel back on my memories of various events. In particular it cost me being a better runner and it was after high school that I vowed I wouldn't ever let fear hold me back again.

But I know that I have still done it and now as I undergo a change in my work situation, I'm finding myself remembering how often I have worried about various things and how I worried endlessly only for them to work out. And then I've wondered why I put so much energy into worrying. 

Why do we worry so much? Is this a life lesson we're supposed to learn? For me, I believe it's more about learning to trust, to have faith, to know that I don't have to soak up my energy into fear. Instead I need to be fearless.

I know that life is short, it's something that drives me daily to make the most of each day. The less the fear we have, the more authentic lives we are living.

Don't wait. Don't let fear hold you back. Be fearless and make whatever it is you want happen. That's exactly what I'm doing.

Building the Dream

I saw this on one of my recent Facebook memories:

"In elementary school when asked what I would do with $1 million, I always wrote buy a house with modern furniture and an in the ground pool."

I'm sure I found it written in something my mom had saved from elementary school. I have no memory if specifically writing that although I do remember that was how I pictured my life as adult.

What struck me, however, is that without a million dollars, I made this happen. As my hairdresser Amanda said, as she was cutting my hair last week, "You built it."

I'm sure in elementary school I thought it would take a million dollars to make my dream come true. But now what I understand is that it really takes a belief in a dream and the willingness to work toward that dream. I call my house, like I do my Chelle Summer brand, "modern design with a retro twist."

It hasn't always been easy. The hardest part has been the patience in learning to build something that might not happen in one day. It took me a long time collect the furniture, to figure out how some of it could be redone to be made new again, and also to select colors that worked in the rooms. There have been mistakes a long the way but I can see where the constant rearranging of my bedroom growing up, the Barbie houses my younger sister Denise and I built, and just the freedom to dream got me here.

There is always much more to do– and always something to fix and update– but when I look around, I'm proud of where I live and how far it came from essentially a blank slate with a lot of potential. 

It's just one of my dreams I've made come true. There are more to come.