Taking Time To Pause

‎"Everything important happens in the pause."
~Nilofer Merchant

Where and when do you pause? Most of us, including me, make “to-do” lists, but how many of us make “to-be” lists?

How do you want to walk in this world?

Pausing—sitting still—enables the “being” to occur. And yes, we are human beings, not human doings. I paused today while Drew was taking a nap. Little kids often pause through naps, and sometimes big kids do, too.

While Drew was napping, I went outside, stood on the back deck overlooking the creek and wooded area behind Merri and Kevin’s house, and paused. It was sunny with a blue sky and temperatures in the low 50s. I drank a good strong cup of ginger tea and soaked in the beauty of their backyard. It was lovely.

When Drew woke up, we went outside and ran in the backyard with Sally, the Corgi who lives next door. That was a pause from my typical routine. Perhaps a pause doesn’t necessarily have to be a silent occurrence. Maybe it can also be something that takes you out of your regular routine and causes you to savor the present moment.

Pausing to take in the wonder of the present moment whether you are meditating, bearing witness, soaking up nature, sipping a cup of tea, or running in the woods with your nephew is important and good and wonderful.

I look forward to pausing more often in the upcoming year. What about you?

Let Your Life Speak

Since this is the season of graduations, I thought it would be fun to share a few insights I have stumbled upon over the last 18 years of working with college students. Because I was too busy working on a book report this spring to accept any of the many invitations to deliver a commencement address, I decided to write one anyway. Congratulations to the Class of 2011.
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I challenge you to show up to your life and be open to possibilities. Say yes to invitations, activities, and opportunities. Show up! If invited to participate in an activity, event, dinner, film, or something out of the ordinary that you may be hesitant to do---I say: "Go for it." Try something new, say yes, and show up.

"Eighty percent of success is showing up.” ~Woody Allen

I encourage you to ask questions of yourself without feeling the pressure of having to come up with immediate, concrete answers. Taking time to consider the questions themselves will give you space and freedom to reflect on what is possible and to imagine creative ways to address the many questions that will be posed to you throughout your life. As many have reminded me, there are not a lot of easy answers in life, but there are a lot of great questions.

"Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer." ~Rilke

Say Thank You. Sounds simple enough, but these 2 words may be the most under-utilized words in our society.

If the only prayer you ever say in your entire life is thank you, it will be enough. ~Meister Eckhart

Take risks.

There are risks and costs to a program of action, but they are far less than the long-range risks and costs of comfortable inaction. ~John F. Kennedy

Laugh. Young children laugh around 300+ times a day. As adults, that decreases to less than 10 times daily. See the humor in life and laugh with others. This is different than laughing at the expense of others of course. Laughter increases endorphins and is good for you!

"You grow up the day you have your first real laugh at yourself."~Ethel Barrymore

Find joy in the present moment. I have a simple time management philosophy: you make time for what is important to you. You can't buy time, save time, stock pile time—you must live in the present moment. Worrying about the past and fearing the future distracts us from the present. We miss out on the here and now because we are living in the past or hurrying to get to the future.

“What we do in love and kindness is all that we will ever leave behind.” ~Carrie Newcomer

Give back and don't underestimate your ability to contribute and make a difference. Nobody can do everything, but everybody can do something. We all make a difference. It just depends what kind of difference you want to make.

"We must not, in trying to think about how we can make a big difference, ignore the small daily differences we can make which, over time, add up to big differences we often cannot foresee." ~Marian Wright Edelman

Define success not extrinsically but intrinsically. Pay attention to what makes you tick, what inspires you, and what brings you joy.

"The very least you can do in your life is figure out what you hope for. And the most you can do is live inside that hope. Not admire it from a distance, but live right in it, under its roof." ~Barbara Kingsolver

Be yourself. Parker Palmer recounts the Hasidic tale that powerfully illustrates the importance of being one’s self:

Rabbi Zusya, when he was an old man said, “In the coming world, they will not ask me ‘Why were you not Moses?’ They will ask me: ‘Why were you not Zusya?’”

Leave people and places better than when you found them!

“What you leave behind isn't what is engraved in stone monuments, but what is woven into the lives of others." ~Pericles

Go and do good…and let your life speak!

Elie Wiesel's Commencement Speech to Washington U Graduates on May 20, 2011

And furthermore, I believe that the human being — any human being of any community, any origin, any color — a human being is eternal. Any human being is a challenge. Any human being is worthy of my attention, of my love occasionally. And therefore I say it to you: When you are now going into a world which is hounded, obsessed with so much violence, often so much despair — when you enter this world and you say the world is not good today, good! Correct it! That’s what you have learned here for four years from your great teachers. Go there, and tell them what you remember. Tell them that the nobility of the human being cannot be denied.

I’m sure you have learned French literature. I’m sure you have learned about Albert Camus, the great philosopher and novelist. In his famous novel, The Plague, at the end Dr. Rieux, who was the main character of the novel, sees a devastated city, thousands and thousands of victims from the plague. And this doctor at the end says, it’s true, all that is true.

But nevertheless, I believe, he said, there is more in any human being to celebrate than to denigrate. I repeat: There is more in any human being to celebrate than to denigrate.

Let’s celebrate. Thank you.

--Elie Wiesel

Note: The above is an excerpt from Elie Wiesel's speech to Washington University's Class of 2011.

To read the entire speech, here is a link:
http://news.wustl.edu/news/Pages/22353.aspx

Love is Simple

I want a simple love like that
Always giving never asking back
When I'm in my final hour looking back
I hope I had a simple love like that
--Sarah Siskind, songwriter

On May 15, 1945, Charles Davis and Marion Page were married. When I called my grandmother to wish her and my grandfather a happy 66th anniversary, I asked her what she remembered about her wedding day.

She said they got married at the preacher’s house.

I asked her what time of day, and she said it was in the afternoon.

I asked her who was there, and she said her brother Vodrey and his girlfriend, Kathleen. She said that Vodrey was in the service and had made her promise not to get married until he came home.

She said it was a simple service.

Love is simple, and sixty-six years ago today my grandparents who were 17 at the time, made a promise to one another.

Love is simple, but life can be complicated. And my grandparent’s lives have been both full of love and challenges. Love sustains them, and they have built their lives on a foundation of love and faith.

I deeply admire my grandparents. They kept their promise to one another through the good times and the challenging times.

They model love by living simply and humbly, by focusing on family and faith, and by caring for one another.

They are the parents of three children including Alice (my mom), Norma, and Chuck.

They lost a child: my aunt, Norma, who died in 1993 at age 46.

They have 6 grandchildren and 3 great-grandchildren.

They have lived through both joy-filled times and really difficult times. And they kept their promise.

Their wedding ceremony on that Tuesday afternoon in May of 1945 was as my grandmother said: simple.

And their love and marriage have exemplified that love is indeed simple…and strong….and love is all there is.

Happy Anniversary, Granny and Bigdaddy:
When I'm in my final hour looking back I hope I had a simple love like that!

Poem for Mother's Day

Every spirit that walks this good earth
Was once some mother's perfect baby boy or girl.
Born with a roar of triumph
With relief and laughter
With the deepest longing and hope…
That this little one,
This precious child
Might know a better, kinder world.

I imagine the greatest honor
and finest gift we could give our mothers,
Is to try without ceasing
To create that better world.

--Carrie Newcomer

College Reunion

Education is what remains after one has forgotten what one has learned in school.
~Albert Einstein

This weekend, I was in Lexington, Kentucky for my 20th college reunion from Transylvania University. Reconnecting with this chapter in my life was good for my heart and soul. I am grateful for the friendships cultivated and renewed over the weekend. And I am thankful for the Transylvania University community: past, present, and future.

I Come From...

I come from the South—a product of a long line of Kentuckians. I come from Southern hospitality—a strong community—a legacy of love.

My grandparents will celebrate 66 years of marriage on May 15 of this year. My parents will celebrate 43 years of marriage on June 15. My other grandparents would have celebrated 66 years of April 1, but my granfather died in November of 2008.

I come from love.

I come from a place where you say hello when you meet someone on the sidewalk or in the aisle of the grocery store—even if you don’t really know them.

I come from a place that still says “yes sir” and “yes maam.”

I come from good Southern cooking—gravy and biscuits, green beans, and coconut cream pie…and the original Kentucky fried chicken.

I come from mystery—I don’t know exactly where I come from, and I know precisely where I come from.

I come from my past, my present, and my future.

I am not alone…I come from support, understanding, faith, hope, and love.

I come from doing the best I can with what I’ve got.

I come from generosity.

It is my hope that the foundation of who I am and where I have come from serves as a catalyst to contribute, to make a difference, and to return that love, support, understanding to others along the journey.

Life comes full circle and all that I am and all that I do and all that I have circles back to others. As Carrie Newcomer reminds me, “Love and kindness is all we ever leave behind.”

I come from love and kindness.

We Stand on the Shoulders of Those Who Come Before Us

“We stand on the shoulders of those who come before us.”
--Maya Angelou

At this time in the spring semester, we have a tradition of meeting with the returning Wash U RAs thirty minutes prior to welcoming the new RAs and signing contracts. We discuss the importance of their stepping up as leaders and role models for the staff. We thank them for recommitting for a second or perhaps third year.

We also take the opportunity to remind them that they are a part of a long line of RAs—a strong program built on the foundation of student leaders dedicated to creating respectful, welcoming communities, to helping their residents succeed both in and outside of the classroom, and to being part of a team that cares about one another.

I then mention that I “see” former RA sitting amongst them. I even list off names of former RAs that I see (at which time, I make fun of myself for “seeing” people who are not actually there.)

This year, I saw Debbie Busler, Aimee Israel, Michelle Purdy, Erin Stafford, Tim Bono, Sagar Ravi, Katherine Clapham, Taylor Poling, Jimmy Cox, Caitlin Hearns, and Mike Pope (mostly I heard Mike Pope singing). I truly feel the presence of all of the RAs I have had the honor of knowing over the last 18 years. They are in the room. Their presence is in our midst.

We stand on their shoulders.

We are the organization that we are because of the dedicated RAs that have come before us.

This weekend, I literally had the opportunity to see many of those RAs who were on campus for Young Alumni Reunion and was reminded of their enthusiasm, their strengths, their commitment, their sense of humor, and their leadership.

Several RA alums commented that RA training has created not only an enduring memory, but that it has also developed a lasting impact on how they approach both their professional and personal lives.

Diversity training, “I” statements, nonverbal communication, programming, team building, and the ever popular “leaving places cleaner then we found them.”

This mantra has transformed into leaving people and places better than we found them. And that is exactly what the Wash U RA alums have done.

Thank you. We continue to stand on your shoulders.

What Brings Me Life...

What brings me life is embedded in the heart and soul: it is the mystery that unfolds in ways that we can never imagine.

And sometimes I want to know how it will all end up. I want to have a crystal ball and know about 5 years on.

But what brings me life is the present moment—the not knowing that requires trust and faith—trust and faith that is often bigger than I am.

What brings me life is leaning into the unknown—knowing that I don’t have to know it all—releasing the grip of fear and opening up my arms and my heart to love.

As the Beatles say, "Love is all there is." And why try to figure it all out when life is truly a mystery?

What brings me life is traveling through the mystery with other seekers and dreamers—companions on the journey.

What brings me life is the a-ha of now and the realization that today is a good day and today is all we have and love is all there is.

Happy Birthday Miracles and Joy to the World!

Two years ago today, I got the call that a baby boy was making his way in to the world. I drove from St. Louis to Louisviile & met my nephew a few minutes after he was born. JOY to the world & happy 2nd birthday to DREW!

He brings such happiness, joy, and laughter to our family. Drew puts things in perspective and reminds us as Thich Nhat Hanh claims,
"All is a miracle."

People usually consider walking on water or in thin air a miracle. But I think the real miracle is not to walk either on water or in thin air, but to walk on earth.

Every day we are engaged in a miracle we don't even recognize: a blue sky, white clouds, green leaves, the curious eyes of a child, our own two eyes.

All is a miracle.

~ Thich Nhat Hanh