Aesop was a Scientist.

July 19, 2014 Molly Daniels HayesLeave a comment

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Chances are, like me, you’ve heard a hundred versions Aesop’s fable, “The Oak and the Reed,” wherein we’re taught to bend like a reed in a storm, instead of remaining stalwart
as an oak which will be blown over.

The moral is to remain flexible in the face of
challenge or adversity, instead of becoming rigid and unmoving. To move with
the times, to let things shift around you without trying to control them or how
they’re affecting you. To be at ease with how things are, because when the
storm does pass, if you’ve remained reed-like, you’ll stand up into the
sunlight again.

Yes, we’ve all heard this, and again if you’re like
me, you vacillate between these flora’s coping mechanisms, flexible to rigid and
back again. Sometimes within the same hour.

However, one story I didn’t know was one I heard on
the little audio book I’m listening to now: The
Biodome Moral.

(Unfortunately, this has nothing to do with the Pauly Shore
movie, but it’s valuable nonetheless.)

Scientists in the 80s, the book reports, created a perfect
replica of Earth and Earth’s atmosphere within a dome. They then sent 8
scientists into the dome to live there for 2 years. Among their findings was
what happened to the trees.

Inside the dome, there was no wind and no storms. The
scientists assumed that without the challenges of storms to damage the trees,
they would grow taller and stronger and faster than those outside the dome.

Indeed, the trees grew faster and taller. But not stronger.

The trees were weak, and easily uprooted. The scientists
discovered that the trees needed the challenge of the storms, of withstanding the storms, in order to become strong and healthy.
By eliminating all adversity from their lives, they became big and tall, sure,
but they also became hollow and weak.

Remind us of any other species?

I am not an advocate for adversity. I bristle vehemently when told that adversity is “a blessing,” as I’m
occasionally told about my cancer.

Which, by the way – never tell someone that. If they want to say that to you, great; listen, nod, be compassionate.
But never be the one to tell them that it makes them stronger, never tell them
that there will be a gift from it, or that it is itself a gift. All these
things may be true, but fuck you, healthy person, for telling me to look on
the bright side of leaking out my ass for a
month. Even though you mean it authentically, lovingly, and truthfully.

I happen to know
these things are true. I write here that they are; that having had that
adversity has impelled and propelled me to engage in my life and in activities
that I’d procrastinated on; necessitated my creating new relationships and boundaries that
I’d been too scared to create before. Having had and survived cancer has
irrevocably changed the rest of my life and given miles of perspective to every
other storm I may encounter.

But if you haven’t noticed, sometimes we get tired of
encountering storms, and I’d really prefer for you to not steal my lemons to
make your own lemonade. — And I still wouldn’t call it a blessing. An opportunity, I’d concede. But I’m sure no one ever said: Bless me, father, with life-threatening illness.

… I guess I still have some letters of complaint to write to the Universe’s customer service department.

So,

The absence of storms makes us weaker. But, the
preponderance of storms makes us exhausted.

To continue in fable-speak then, I suppose it’s appropriate
to quote Goldilocks on the merits of balance and the middle way. To endeavor to
create, withstand, be free from and grow from challenges that are not too big, not too small, but “Just
Right.”

abundance · aspiration · community · fear · fun · synchronicity · truth · trying

In case you weren’t sure, I was the one dancing.

July 18, 2014 Molly Daniels HayesLeave a comment

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Last night, I got an email reply to my inquiry about volunteering for a day-long community social action project in the Fall. The
call was for artists of all types, and if I’m anything, I am an artist of all
types!

The email came back: YES! We’d love to have you; here are
some painting projects: Create a mural; touch-up-paint a building; paint a wall; help kids decorate bags for food that will be donated.

If you read my blog, Men at Work, about circumstances that have come to
fruition since being put in my “G-d box,” you may remember (as I do, since it’s
now tacked to my fridge) that in that box was a list of things I wanted to do,
accomplish, or participate in. The second on the list, just after “being in a band,” is painting a mural.

At the time I was writing my blog about it, the mural didn’t
seem so important anymore. In fact, I reflected, “Sure that’d still be totally
rad!” but that doing a mural doesn’t feel as
prioritized as some of the other items on the list, like finding a creative job
I enjoy, or being in a musical.

And yet. Here’s an opportunity I would never have thought
would come to be an opportunity!

The email said the mural would be in collaboration, and
there’s more info that I’d gather from the committee members, so I wouldn’t be
doing this in isolation at all.

However, I notice, too, that my typical/habitual reaction is to say, “I’m not an artist on that scale or level, so I’ll take the job of helping the
kids decorate lunch bags.”

I know that’s my automatic response. I know that’s my fear
response. But, I also know that there’s validity in saying, I’ve never done
this before, and I would love to help, but I’d also need help.

And, so, that’s likely what I’ll say. I’ll be honest with
where my talents are, but also where my aspiration is. I mean, if I never, ever
step out of what my comfort zone is, how will I ever know what I am capable of,
hm?

That doesn’t mean taking risks at the detriment of a
community project just to say, “Of course I can do it.” It’s detrimental to me (and to them) if I take steps that are developmentally inappropriate out of fear or pride. That doesn’t mean not to stretch out of my comfort zone (which, FYI participating a mural at all is!!), but it does mean that I start with a 5 mile hike, not 10.

This all feels very parallel to the job of the lead role in the play I was offered. I know it’s a stretch of my talents. I know I’ve never done it before, but unlike the play, the mural is something I’d really love to do. I appreciate the organization, their mission, and think it would be a lot of fun.

More will be revealed. I will let them know my truth, and be willing to say, “I
don’t know if I can take the lead on this project, but I would love to be ‘second in command’ or co-chair of it — truly involved in its creation and completion.”

Instead of playing it safe with the colored bags (something I know I can land easily, have fun with but not be learning much), I think the way to “dare greatly” here is
to offer to help out on the mural however I can, and learn a whole lot on the
way. Then maybe next time, I can confidently say Yes to taking the lead.

Here’s to being willing to cross more items off that list! (And here’s to my “daring greatly” in the first place by writing to them that I wanted to be involved at all.)

authenticity · connection · disconnection · poetry · theater

"Person-To-Person"

July 17, 2014 Molly Daniels HayesLeave a comment

Of course it is a pity that so much of all creative work is so closely related to the personality of the one who does it.

It is sad and embarrassing and unattractive that those emotions that stir him deeply enough to demand expression, and to charge their expression with some measure of light and power, are nearly all rooted, however changed in their surface, in the particular and sometimes peculiar concerns of the artist himself, that special world, the passions and images of it that each of us weaves about him from birth to death, a web of monstrous complexity, spun forth at a speed that is incalculable to a length beyond measure, from the spider mouth of his own singular perceptions.

It is a lonely idea, a lonely condition, so terrifying to think of that we usually don’t. And so we talk to each other, write and wire each other, call each other short and long distance across land and sea, clasp hands with each other at meeting and at parting, fight each other and even destroy each other because of this always somewhat thwarted effort to break through walls to each other. As a character in a play once said, “We’re all of us sentenced to solitary confinement inside our own skins.”

Personal lyricism is the outcry of prisoner to prisoner from the cell in solitary where each is confined for the duration of his life.

[…]

Of course I know that I have sometimes presumed too much upon corresponding sympathies and interest in those to whom I talk boldly, and this has led to rejections that were painful and costly enough to inspire more prudence. But when I weigh one thing against another, an easy liking against a hard respect, the balance always tips the same way, and whatever risk of being turned a cold shoulder, I still don’t want to talk to people only about the surface aspects of their lives, the sort of things that acquaintances laugh and chatter about on ordinary social occasions.

I feel that they get plenty of that, and heaven knows so do I, before and after the little interval of time in which I have their attention and say what I have to say to them. The discretion of social conversation, even among friends, is exceeded only by the discretion of “the deep six,” that grave wherein nothing is mentioned at all. Emily Dickinson, that lyrical spinster of Amherst, Massachusetts, who wore a strict and savage heart on a taffeta sleeve, commented wryly on that kind of posthumous discourse among friends in these lines:

I died for beauty, but was scarce
Adjusted in the tomb,
When one who died for truth was lain
In an adjoining room.

He questioned softly why I failed?
“For beauty,” I replied.
“And I for truth,—the two are one;
We brethren are,” he said.

And so, as kinsmen met at night,
We talked between the rooms,
Until the moss had reached our lips,
And covered up our names.

Meanwhile!—I want to go on talking to you as freely and intimately about what we live and die for as if I knew you better than anyone else whom you know.

TENNESSEE WILLIAMS, preface to Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, 1955.

abundance · acting · authenticity · choice · community · fear · scarcity · self-worth · trying

Car Conversations

July 16, 2014 Molly Daniels HayesLeave a comment

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Because the question isn’t: “Would you rather be in a play
or not be in a play?” anymore. Maybe that’s what it was a year ago. But my
vision has changed, as visions are allowed to do. And more, it’s
probably that I’ve allowed myself to see more of my vision, rather than it actually
“changing.”

Now, the question is: “Would I rather be in a play, or be in a
good play?”

It’s the same coin as the line of thinking that goes: Well,
at least you have a job.

That, at its core, is very true, but it seems to me that
when we’re living in integrity with our values in as many places in our lives
as possible, we’re doing more good – for ourselves and for the world.

When people
are living lives that are engaged, they inspire me. There are circumstances
that can keep us from this expression of our true selves and skills, surely.
There’s war famine racism classism sexism disease and all manner of ill
fortune. I recognize the privilege it is that I’ve been able to crawl out of (and partially
been born out of) the first tier of “Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs,” out of the
pure and simple satisfaction of the needs for food, shelter, clothing, and
income.

I am reminded of a phone conversation I had with my mom
several years ago. I was in the car with a friend when my cell rang. I
answered, we spoke a few minutes, and the call ended. What struck me later wasn’t the content of the call, but how I behaved during the call. My friend overheard every word and all the
manner and mannerisms that came out during my conversation – and those
behaviors would align perfectly with how I interact with my friend.

There was little to no difference between how I comported
myself in relation to my mom and how I was in relation to my friend. That
alignment of “personalities” was completely new to me. I was always someone different with friends, coworkers, family
members, lovers. Although there are necessary adjustments you need to make in
those various relationships, I was always way out of alignment – they all were completely disparate personalities.

My car conversation allowed me to see that I was “aligning
the films of who I am,” as I later put it. It wasn’t about a shift from
wearing different masks to wearing the same mask; it was about relieving myself
of the masks at all – and being the same ol’ me no matter where, when, or who.

This feels completely parallel to my circumstances and
predicaments these days: How to bring the same person, with the same
boundaries, needs, and self-esteem, to work, to play, to relationship.

How to live in integrity, which, to me, means aligning the
films of ourselves. Not participating in self-abandonment, and bringing every
endeavor and relationship into the light, and questioning if it meets our
standards of what we want for ourselves, and if we’re meeting those standards through our own action.

It’s all well and good to report and purport that I want to
cease settling for less in many areas of my life; it’s another endeavor
entirely to take actions that support that desire. Again, that’s integrity – being who you say you want to be.

I’ve come to the conclusion that I am leaving this play.
When my friend last night told me that her “intuitive hit” was that I could
find work that I love, I began to well up. It’s not about permission to do the play or not do the play, even — it’s about giving myself permission to do that which I love. In every arena of my life right now, I’m
endeavoring to find that which I love – which starts from acknowledging
and listening to and giving enough credence to self-love to do that.

If I am purporting that I want to do what I love, but there
are still these fissures of contrary action, I’m offering a divided message to
“the Universe,” but mostly to myself. If I engage in that which doesn’t feed my
soul and my joy-meter, I’m giving the message that it’s (still) okay to abandon my
desires, and that my desires aren’t that important to me anyway.

It’s time for me to have a car conversation with the
Universe, one in which I am myself – self-confident with a hint of doubt, a vehement believer in the need for joy and
alignment, more than a tad bit wacky – no matter who’s on the other line.

abundance · adulthood · awareness · father · fear · scarcity · self-compassion · truth

Thou Shalt…

July 15, 2014 Molly Daniels HayesLeave a comment

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I’m always hesitant to share my meditations. Like listening
to someone report their dream, which to the dreamer is a fascinating pursuit,
and to the listener is … not. But. This morning’s meditation was too
illustrative and too relevant to current musings not to report. So, bear with.

“What is blocking me from making this decision around the
play?” Around quitting or staying in it. I can’t even get to a firm decision either way, get a spiritual “hit”
either way – even after conversation, taking an inventory of my fears around it
both ways, and even after regular old “getting quiet” meditation.

So, this morning, I plugged the headphones into my iPod, scrolled to the drumming meant for this type of meditation and went in on a Shamanic Journey to find out what the
heck is going on since the “normal” pathways to clarity are so gummed up.

Standing, in my mind’s eye, at the edge of the cliff that
overlooks all the land that makes up my self (occasionally I’m reminded of Mufasa
showing Simba all the land in Africa that is his domain), I asked the above
question: What is blocking me from making my decision?

Without warning, the sky turned black, the light sucked out
of the land, and a voice stormed, “You have to do this play.” This was no gentle
cosmic answer. This was violent insistence. This was, I don’t care whether
you want to do it or not; you have to.

This, is not my voice. But, apparently, it’s there inside
me, blocking my decisions. I certainly can’t even know whether I want to do the play or not, if there’s a damning demand to do it regardless of my desire. This wasn’t a request, this was
an order. This wasn’t a suggestion, this was a decree.

And if you’ve read me for any period of time, you know that
voice is probably internalized from a parental source of the masculine
variety.

The fear, no, terror,
I felt when everything turned black was so evocative of how I felt as a child,
I’d forgotten what it feels like to feel so small, so unimportant.
On my couch, in my living room, in 2014, I pulled my blanket tight around me
and cowered into the cushions.

There are cases and circumstances when, certainly, we don’t want to do things. As you also know, I hate doing my
dishes. But, I do them. I know I “have to.” I know that as a child, we’re
required to do things that we don’t want to do, because it’s for the good of
the family, the good of your education, the good of your health (who wants to get a teeth cleaning?). But, this isn’t that.

As I recorded in my journal what occurred during meditation, I wrote what came to mind after it – the counter, the compassionate
response to this demonic, demanding voice: “Molly, You don’t have to do the
play if you don’t want to. There is no wrong decision here: If you do it,
you’ll have more opportunities to do things you love; if you don’t do it,
you’ll have more opportunities to do things you love. This is an abundant
world. Just keep honing your vision and asking for help.”

Because there is no
right or wrong here. But I haven’t been able to get anywhere on this choice because there’s been this internal override preventing me from making it. I can’t know what I want if I don’t think I’m allowed to figure that
out.

This still doesn’t make my decision one way or the other … yet. But, I suspect that identifying, addressing, and removing the block to making
one will help.

Uncategorized

No Blog; Radio

July 14, 2014 Molly Daniels HayesLeave a comment

Two elephants are in the shower.

One elephant says, Pass the Soap.

The other elephant responds, No soap, Radio.

* * *

For reasons unknown to me, my mom used to repeat this Dada-esque joke often, but the shorthand just became, No soap, Radio.

It’s shorthand for something absurd, but also something just silly to say when someone asks you to pass something.

The reason there’s “no” blog today, is I set my morning alarm for 5 PM instead of 5 AM for my morning shift at the Dailey Method workout studio. So, I awoke at 6am and didn’t really have the necessary time or “grounding” that serves as the springboard for this lovely (crafted) brain-dump forum.

Therefore, please let this blog serve as an homage to the absurd and an opportunity to picture two elephants in a shower. I’ll let you ponder if either of them are wearing a bathing cap.

balance · boundaries · career · creativity · meditation · self-care

You Spin Me Right Roun’…

July 13, 2014 Molly Daniels HayesLeave a comment

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I’ve been looking up meditation retreats. There’s this one
I’ve heard about for years that’s a 10-day silent meditation retreat – I
remember a guy I knew once shared that his therapist advised him against going on a silent retreat! (He went anyway, and
reported great tidings.)

But, one thing I always seem to forget until after I’ve gone
on such a retreat or weekend away is that I can effect the same kind of stillness without going so far, and without paying so much.

I remember last year, I went north to Marin to participate
in a half-day meditation retreat. The meditation itself was lovely; the grounds
are nestled into the hillside near the ocean, and there’s an organic farm and
garden you can walk through during the walking meditation part. But… the zen
talk… eek.

This day’s particular teacher stuck in my craw the whole time, so before the second “dharma talk,” I left. I felt good about having gone, being
among the greenery and the eucalyptus. I even saw a chipmunk on my way back to
the parking lot. But, I didn’t need to stay and “practice listening” to someone
whose personality shone way larger than his teachings. It was way more about
him, than his teachings.

As I left, I noted that I could have found the same or a
similar degree of stillness, just by driving up into the nearby national park
in Berkeley. I didn’t have to sit in a “zen-do” or listen to teachings –
really, I just wanted to listen to the silence, and although I can do that in
my own home, I prefer to go somewhere nature-y when I really want to recharge.

I’m reminded of this as I look up retreats this morning: a
day-long one at the same retreat center, the 10-day silent retreat place, even
a hot-spring zen-center-meets-spa related to a nearby center.

But really, what do I want to achieve or gain or experience?
Stillness.

I feel very harried at the moment, with a lot of irons in
the fire around creative endeavors, work endeavors, and even friend endeavors.

I’ve been wanting to strengthen my relationships with
friends, form new or stronger connections, and this weekend has been the
perfect exercise in that – it’s been chock
full of friend-related activities that have been truly wonderful. But, I’m tired.

Yesterday morning, spur-of-the-moment birthday plans were texted to
me: “Join me in Marin for dinner and a hike under the full moon.”

Um, Yes, please!

None of the 6 dinner attendees knew anyone except the
birthday boy, and we had a great time. The hike was fantastic. Epic, really.
The view over the Bay, the fog rolling in, the lights below, the reflection of
the “super moon” in the water. – That, my friends, was meditative.

But, it also wasn’t. Different personalities require
different levels of reverence, and for some people, silence isn’t really an
option. – I’d love to go back and experience it in the quiet. It was
awe-inspiring.

And, I wasn’t home til after midnight … which if you didn’t
know, is way past my bedtime. But, so
worth it!

However, I begin to feel a draw inward. I’m an “X” in the
“introvert/extrovert” Meyers-Briggs scale. Meaning, I am neither an “I:
Introvert” nor an “E: Extrovert” – I fall so perfectly between the two, needing
both in such equal amounts, that I am an “X: Right in the middle.”

So, with all of this external push (creative stuff, job
stuff, friend stuff), Anty needs a recharge. (Honey, I Shrunk the Kids reference, fyi.)

But, it is important for me to remember that I don’t need to
retreat from the whole world, put huge parameters around my life in order to do
this. It’s as simple as committing 2 hours, getting in my car, driving 20
minutes, and crunching through the soft-fallen eucalyptus leaves until I get to a spot
where I can sit – no incense required.

acting · authenticity · commitment · dating · falsehoods · fear · insecurity · pride · self-abandonment · self-worth · truth

Note: In this evening’s performance, the role of Pride will be replaced by Truth.

July 12, 2014 Molly Daniels HayesLeave a comment

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She held up her fingers:

“One: Is it a theater company or director you really want to work with?” No, not really.

“Two: Are they paying you really well?” No, zilch.

“Three: Is it a play you are excited about and really want to do?” No,
not at all. It’s awful.

“Then don’t do
it,” she concluded.

But I auditioned for him three times.

“So, what? Say that something else came up and you’re really
sorry. The thing is, that’s a huge commitment for somewhere you don’t want to
be. You’d be wasting time that you could use honing your craft, going on other
auditions, taking classes, and finding something you really
want to do.”

But it’d be my first lead
role.

“Yeah, in a play where the actors outnumber the audience for a play you don’t want to be in. That sucks; take it from me.”

* * *

This was the conversation I had last night with my friend
who’s a semi-professional actress when I told her I was having doubts about the play in which I’m cast. She said these were the 3 golden questions
her acting teacher said the actor had to answer for himself. The instructor,
being at a higher level, said that for him, he has to answer Yes to all three
of those questions. For my friend, mid-tier, she was told, No more crap jobs:
She has to answer Yes to at least two of those questions.

And for me, beginner, I have to answer Yes to at least one of those questions.

Otherwise, what the hell am I doing with my time? What am I
saying my time means to me?

I am very much associating all this with my job/career
search. If a guy continues to get promoted up through the ranks at a company he
doesn’t enjoy, doing work he hates, but is paid really well, is that enough? I can’t say.

If we’re not getting
paid well, doing work we love or working with people we enjoy… well, what are
we doing?

If we can’t answer Yes to any of these questions in regards
to career, why are we there? Why are we wasting any days of this short life?

I don’t yet know if I’m going to bow out of the play in
which I’ve been cast. When I told her again that I auditioned for him 3 times — meaning, I feel that he’s already put such time and effort into me and my performance I’d feel guilty dropping out — she
replied, “Take care of yourself, not them.” … Oh… right.

Because the reality is that I will be in rehearsals for 3
hours nearly every day of the week for two months… for a really awful play. It’s really awful, folks. Not like, passable,
manageable, I’m just being picky — It’s really awful. It’s terribly written. I’d walk out, if I were an audience member.

Because it wouldn’t have been worth my time.

No matter how great I am or am not in the play, my heart
wouldn’t be in it – and if it’s not, then that’ll show up, too. I roll my eyes
every time I read the script. I say aloud to my cat, “This is a really awful
play,” each time I start to rehearse it.

I don’t know yet. It’s a hard judgment call, you know? I
asked my friend, What about having to work your way up the ladder, and take
shitty jobs at first? She pointed me back to those three questions. Where are my values?

Is my hesitation to drop out about my having a lead role, so I can feel pride? Pride over a notation on my resume? Pride
over something that I’m not proud of? Is it about status? Is it about feeling this proves that I’m worthy; that I’m good?

How can you feel worthy about something you’re not proud of?
That doesn’t compute.

I’m meeting with another actor friend of mine tomorrow to
run lines for this play. I’m hoping to get insight in conversation with him –
if it’s really as awful as I think it is.

But, I already know it is.

What my friend told me was that I should audition for
everything, but don’t go to callbacks if it’s a terrible play!

I’m reminded, once again, of the dating/job interview
corollary: It’s great to say Yes to the first date or interview. But after
that, you’ve garnered enough information to know if you want to try it out again
or not. I don’t have to show up a second time, if I’m really sure this is not a fit.

So, yes, it would be really great to say that I’m the Queen
of the Amazons. It makes me feel worthy and proud and like I’m not making a huge mistake in going after this dream. But isn’t the mistake not respecting what really want, and settling for (way) less, just so I can say I have a lead? Isn’t the mistake I’ve been loathe to make in relationships settling for less than I want, just so I can say I have a partner?

Wouldn’t I rather be somewhere where I’m excited and learning
something, instead of just clocking time?

action · fear · self-doubt · self-worth · truth

The Sixty-Four Thousand Dollar Question

July 11, 2014 Molly Daniels HayesLeave a comment

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During my current “job/purpose/life
direction/authenticity+security” search, a friend suggested a workbook to me.
Yesterday, I downloaded it on Audible (yay, free trial!) and began to listen to
it as I upkept my house, doing laundry from the camping trip, unpacking my bags
from it. And one of the questions it asks a few chapters in, is one I
paused the audio to write down and answer for myself:

“What is the one question I’m afraid to ask myself?”

I was both very quick and slow in my answer. Quick, in that
I knew immediately what the question was; slow, in how hesitantly I
wrote it on the page, one halting letter at a time:

“Do I think I’m good enough?”

Below this question, I wrote a second one: “What scares me
about being with people?”

I drew an arrow from my second answer to my first.

Do I think I’m good enough?

It’s easy to give a knee-jerk, Yes, of course I do. But this question is the quiet force of
erosion that hollows out all my actions, my self-esteem, and my ambition.

Interestingly, the question I’m most afraid to ask myself is
not: “Am I good enough?” That one is
much easier for me to answer affirmatively. It’s the part about “thinking” – do
I think I’m good enough – that
hampers me.

And therefore, the thinking is the part that I must step
away from. That I must begin to give less credence to. Because what follows
from that question is, “If I don’t think I’m good enough, do you?” And from
here, I begin to place my self-worth in the hands of others who likely rub up
against their own self-imposed limitations, and can’t possibly answer that for
me in a way, like I said the other day, “that I can feel.”

My ex-boyfriend used to use a word that became an in-joke
with us, because it bothered me so much, and he loved to see me get rankled: Adequate.

He deemed things adequate, and this incensed me! Things are never adequate, I’d retort. They’re either good or not good. The
food wasn’t “adequate,” it was delicious or it was bland. My performance in bed
was never (ever!) “adequate:” it was stunning. (He loved to get me on this one – you
could see steam coming out my ears on this one.)

But, I hated that word beyond anything. I hated the idea of
adequate, of something being “good enough.” What does that even mean??

Very briefly, I watched a t.v. show based on a Stephen King
premise about wish-fulfillment. In it, one of the characters asks the
wish-fullfiller for “enough money.” You can only imagine, in this dark tale,
that “enough” was never enough. There is no exact value for “enough,” and the
woman was always going back for more.

I hated the word adequate, because I interpreted it as
NOT enough. If it were enough – you’d
say that. If it were “adequate,” you’re just giving a “nice” word to something
disappointing.

My ex’s game shows me, now, that my rancor against that word
was because I was living in a definition of “good enough” that meant NOT good
enough. I always hear the phrase with an inflection on the end that indicates
the shoulder-shrug: “Good enough.
(shrug.)”

What does good enough
mean to me? What does adequate mean to me? Can these be positively interpreted?

Because the massive secret is that if does mean good enough, then there’s nothing to stop me from
the pursuit of joy, fulfillment, and living a whole life. If I can change my
understanding of “good enough” to mean, in fact, good enough (without the
shoulder shrug), then the self-doubt falls away, or lessens greatly.

I am a good enough writer. I am a good enough woman. I am
emotionally healthy enough to be in partnership. I am perseverant enough to
continue producing art. I am good enough to submit work.

Some (all?) of these sound strange in my mouth, like it’s filled
with marbles, awkwardly forming words that I’ve never said before, or have been
too dubious to utter. Some of them I so desperately want to believe, I fear
saying them at all, for fear that I’ll fuck it up.

It will always be my brain that thinks – but it will always
be my soul that wants. It’s the vicious impasse that impedes both their efforts that causes me such anguish.

My brain is not strong … enough (ha!) anymore to override
the wantings of my soul. But my soul is not yet bold enough to override the
fearful thinkings of my brain.

The tie-breaker, as always, is the action of my body. I can
type this without my brain’s approval and put it online. I can send an email to
get an audition slot for a musical without my brain’s approval (and believe you, me, I have one chattery brain after sending that email). Action is always
the key to change. Whether it’s my soul in the driver’s seat or my head, they
can engage in the battle of the century behind my eyes, but meanwhile, my foot is pressing the gas, and I appear
to be showing up – adequately.

adulthood · aging · authenticity · confidence · femininity · joy · life · self-acceptance · self-love · vulnerability

"Only Her Hairdresser Knows For Sure!"

July 10, 2014August 9, 2017 Molly Daniels HayesLeave a comment

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I am likely not the only woman to tear up at the sighting of
a gray hair on her head. But I may be one of the few who wells up with tears of
gratitude.

Yesterday, during my morning primping, I noticed a gray
hair. I usually don’t pull them out; this isn’t the first I’ve noticed. But
this one, I decided to.

About 5 inches of silver, shiny, light-catching hair. 5 inches
that have grown back since it all fell out from chemo in late 2012.

Call me crazy, but I’ve never been scared of going gray. I
had none at all before cancer, and several now. But, even before then, I always
thought of it as a rite of passage. As a crowning achievement, really. You’ve
made it. You are alive to go gray at all. You are passing into the stage of life that
is for richness, boldness, satisfaction, self-esteem and a greater degree of self-assurance.

If there’s anything I’ve learned from reading about aging
generations, it’s that so much of our self-questioning begins to fall away once
we reach “a certain age.” We begin to think less about how others see us, and
more to question what we want to leave as a legacy. And this brings with it so
much reflection and truth-finding.

Who wouldn’t want to
age into that category?

Surely, you don’t have to turn 50 to begin to assess your
values and your desires for the remainder of your years. Like me, and surely
others, you can do that at most any age. But it helps to have some experience
behind you to make those choices from a place of peace, not fear.

The first memoir I ever looked at, I didn’t read.

I saw it on a shelf in Borders (when it still existed) about
7 or 8 years ago. I noted the title, looked at the flap, and went on with my day.
But I never forgot about it, and last year finally picked it up to read.

The title? Going Gray:
What I Learned about Beauty, Sex, Work, Motherhood, Authenticity, and
Everything Else That Really Matters. A
woman’s exploration of what that means to “go gray” in our culture and society.
A lifelong hair dyer, she made the decision to give up the illusion, and embrace
whatever lay under the chemicals, for better or worse.

Author Anne Kreamer looks at the history of dying our hair;
goes “undercover” as a woman trying to reinvent herself to re-enter the
workforce to see if image consultants will tell her to dye her now growing-out
grays (none do); and comes to discover that with her new look comes a new clothing
color scheme, and a new confidence.

She also doesn’t purport the superiority of letting her hair
grow out. She talks with successful women who do and don’t dye, and let’s them
have their experience. All she can speak to is her own.

Surely, it helps that she goes gray in a “nice” way, with
silvery and dark chrome strands. Which is much the way I anticipate I will.

With my dark coloring, I imagine that I will go silver,
instead of stale gray, or as my mom describes her (dyed) fading blond: dirty
dishwater.

So, that “beauty in the beast” helps my acceptance, I’m sure.

But what brought me to tears yesterday as I stood there,
admiring this newly-found strand, now plucked and held like a precious object
in my hand, was the reality and giddy reminder I feel every time I find one: I made it. I am alive to have gray hair.

I’m alive to see what will happen with it: if they’ll turn out
all spidery texture and I’ll lament I ever praised finding them. If I’ll
consider dying it after all. Or if I’ll love every single thread of life these gray hairs represent.

I tear up when thinking about this, because it’s true.
Because, like someone admiring a sunset, or their sleeping child, or the taste
of a food never eaten, it means I’m alive.
Which itself means I have a chance and a choice to make my life whatever I want
it to be.

My gray hair represents possibility, transformation, and
authenticity.

Who wouldn’t rejoice?