Conclusion

Thank you one and all for riding this wave with me in 2004.

I end this blog at the same computer at which it started, buried deeply into the safety that is my childhood bedroom. Everything around me is familiar and yet nothing is the same.

This has been the most incredible year of my life.

I cut my hair, left my career, walked away from a dream, sold all my materials goods, said farewell to a city that held me for ten years and ended a relationship with a man who i could have easily stayed with forever. I did it all because at some point i had begun to not recognize myself and i knew i needed to shed all my stories and all my life boats and all my habitual definitions and see what lurked beneath. I set out this year to find a new path and decided ultimately to do it all by myself. There were some points i wondered if i might drown. There were definitly moments that i didn't see the light at the end of the tunnel. But because of my new found faith in It All, in myself, i trusted the Universe and it has delivered me.

And now i am living a life more raw and real and beautiful and authentic than i ever thought imaginable. In fact, like the book that Jordan gave me for Christmas, it seems that i will be living an unimaginable life from here on in.

I have new dreams that quietly grow in me daily...baby dreams, MY dreams - seedlings that i water and nuture and protect...

I have a new geographical home. I look at mountains on my way to work, i dance on beaches that touch the Pacific Ocean, i have a wardrobe of umbrellas.

I have my very own sanctuary. Living on my own is as wondeful as i always thought it would be. My apartment is a home -- warm, welcoming, inspired, safe.

I have kept the old friendships that have embraced my changed and evolved Self and gently released those that have not. I have made so many new friends with such shining souls that i can't believe that i have not known them a lifetime.

I have discovered ways of dancing and singing and writing and performing that are not about competeing and judging and achieving and panicking.

I have looked my ego straight in the face and said - no more will you beat on me. No more will you try to convince me that i am selfish or cold or spoiled or cruel or lazy or fat or a failure. I will not allow you to treat me like shit anymore. The only one welcome here is the Truth and that Truth knows that i am perfect, beautiful, lovable and kind. I have a restraining order out on Ego and my bruises are starting to fade.

I have started a flow of money in my life that feels so good that i refuse to apologize for it or its source -which i know is ultimately Spirit. I like my job for the freedom it has given me, for the safe vehicle that it has provided to get me from there to here. I wear corporate power clothes, i 'do' lunch, i give out business cards, i look forward to weekends. I am having so much fun and although i know it is not where i will end up, i am enjoying the journey.

I have a great car, i have acquired beautiful things, i will most likely acquire more of them...or not. Whatever. I know now that i don't need things and, although i enjoy them, i could sell everything again tomorrow and be perfectly content. What freedom!

I have lost weight, healed my body of several maladies and have an immune system so strong that i feel untouchable.

I have watched my love affair with transpersonal psychology through Course in Miracles, Science of Mind and other New Thought teachings grow and grow and grow. These teachings/philosophies are not a 'phase' i am going through. They are the manifestation of my silent ponderings, the culmination of my 27 year search for home.

Last, but not least, i have been handed Jordan Hart Goode Lewin. I said goodbye to Aidan to do the next leg of my journey alone and i wasn't sure when or how i would ever be ready to be in partnership again. What i forgot was that wasn't a decision i needed to make. Life made it for me. On November 27 i met my next biggest challange. I have redefined myself, proven to myself who i am without anyone, experienced joy on my own under my own direction. Now Life is asking me to do all this while opening completely once again to love. Every fear i have ever had about myself and men and relationships and heartbreaks and sex have come to visit me again in the form of a beautiful man who adores me. I thought at first i wasn't ready, but i know better. Nothing is handed to you that you aren't ready for...

So 2005 will begin with me feeling more myself than ever before AND with my hand being held by a boy from Colarado - who i know is just another angel here to deliver me to myself. I don't know what is going to happen. I get that there are no guarantees. I am aware that i will miss the mark sometimes and feel fear and get lost and be found and redefine stuff day in and day out. I commit only to 2 things: showing up and....well...lol... making up the rest as i go along. But i know. I know that i know that i know.

I have never been so happy. I have never felt so precious. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

"Let the adventure begin, for we are ready. Welcome magic, which is everything real we can not see, welcome insanity, which is everything unexplainable we were taught to fear. Welcome Spirit, which is love, welcome love, which is everything."

Controlling Control and the Co-Dependants

There is nothing easy about two individuals with 20-odd years of heartbreak and drama and experience choosing to share the most intimate parts of themselves and then asking it all to run smoothly, tickety boom.

In a perfect world where we all didn't invest in believeing a bunch of phooey that isn't capital T True, it would be easy. As it is, getting out of love's way is a challange. Then adding sex into the mix makes it an even bigger challange. Four sets of friends are currently getting divorced after a very short try at marriage. We want to share our lives, but in many cases we don't know how. It is tiring work, because it involves having to really look at your stuff, at yourself. It seems easier to stay single. Thus, Christmas time is the biggest season of the year for break ups. I have ex's out there that hate me, some that still resent me and others who won't even think of me. It makes you wonder if it is all worth it...

Then you wake up one morning and you see him sleeping beside you and you remember the night before when he had the courage to show you dark corners of himself .... you feel his hand pressed on your chest right where your heart is as if he almost reached out in his sleep to anchor himself and when he opens his eyes and sees you looking down at him he instantly smiles shyly. This man is both strong and weak and brave and afraid ... he is beautiful when he remembers and he is lost when he forgets. He looks at you to find out if you are still willing to stay and stay even after you've seen bumps ...and you are floored at how, instead of running, everything about him that morning is even more beautiful than it was before. There is nowhere you would rather be and the risks all seem insignificant. Then he kisses you like he must consume you ormaybe the moment and it is perfection and your body is screaming yes and your mind is screaming yes and your heart is screaming yes and so you have your answer...

Yes.

It is worth it.

But what do you think?

I give you: cottoncandy-sticky-fingers, crabapple blossoms, Calgary car rides with mom, caring just 'cause, century homes to renovate, can-can contracts, christmas coming soon, celebration of soltice, coupledom and contact info if you want to call me:

Dec 22-Jan 2: 306-694-1418.

I will await your answers.

Ciao.

Cacophony

"In a wide sea of eyes, i see one pair that i recognize"

With two hours of sleep --- i stumble to put these thoughts down...so screw punctuation today or grammar or sentence structure or or or...

i float.

a cloud descended over the day i walked away from aidan, but in the rain that fell i knew i was washing clean a slate full of hating myself and i eagerly started painting a new picture of me.
i wake up now and i can't believe the life i am living.

i stand in the hallway of corporate souls, eating birthday cake, i sit at lunch with an old friend that has loved me since i was 15, i cash a cheque from a woman i knew and now know and i fall in love again....and again....and again.

this man, head propped up on a pile of blankets, hoping to save the world, hoping to inspire courage...burns an image of himself on my heart and those blue eyes and that red turtle neck sweater and that peanut butter off a spoon...it is a heaven i didn't expect...

so tired. so alive. so thankful for the steps it took to get here.
i even want to hug kevin for being so blind.

50 million parcels will be delivered today by canada post and in less than 50 hours i will be home. Christmas here and no snow but i have presents to give and lessons that i have learned

got on the bus this morning and a woman on the bus had a mental breakdown...started throwing a fit...screaming and running all over the bus...we all had to get off...but all i could think was...she has never had someone hold her face gently and tell her how beautiful she is...she doesn't know...and now we will label her 'mad' and lock her up. I , like jordan, want to save the world from itself and yet

i am back to where i started at the beginning of this blog. telling people where the lake is

when my only real goal should be to keep swimming....

face under water, eyes open...and here comes 2005...waterfalls of happiness...

i give you: you.

it doesn't start with a C, but it is all the heaven you need.

Cough due to Cold

My entire office is sick.

Seems that the miraculous flu shot that everybody was so in panic to get hasn't saved them after all. Yesterday i actually started to wonder if they were all playing a joke on me as one after another they dropped like flies. And here is the kicker - i feel great. Super healthy. Totally immune. My trick - good ol' Science of Mind magic - i just keep knowing that "i don't get sick", that i won't be getting sick and i love every inch of my life. Hey, take it or leave it,but it is working for me.

Wished it worked for my Boston Fern that now sits, a week after i purchased it, dead in my apartment. (And my mother wants me to have children?) Must heal the belief that i kill house plants. Maybe i can just replace it with the belief that i merely kill Boston Ferns...

And what is up with this whole federal income tax thing?? It is blowing my mind! The universe demonstrated some prosperity magic in my life today -- i have received a christmas bonus for all the hard work i did at La Casa and am the only person in the office to receive such a bonus. This stopped my breath in awe at the miracles of spirit and manifestation. Then i opened my cheque and my breath stopped again - this time at how much money had been taken off by the government! The bonus had hiked my salary into a tax bracket that i guess is at a 40-45% range and so, numbers-wise, it looked like the bonus barely even occurred! I have been self-employed for so long that i am not used to this and i can easily start to understand why Canadians are always howling at the moon regarding the rape that is taxes. But, but, but...

If it is all One Thing and if money is merely a tool that is meant to flow in and out easily and if i can reap the benefits of a free and social country that is beautiful and safe and educates its people and leaves no one without health care...then...

I send off half my cheque to the government of Canada with great love and blessings. I thank 20/20 Properties for recognizing my hard work at LaCasa. I buy my Christmas gifts with joy and fun and am still able to watch my debt dwindle before my eyes. I am so blessed, so thankful, so grateful.

A week today i will be home. Tomorrow i get to see Jordan. Friday i get to see Leanne. Sunday i get to see Jason. Monday i catch up with Carman. Today i lunch with Darren. In 8 days i will be bonding with Cory and in less than that i will be driving the number one with JenBen.

I AM HEALTHY, WEALTHY and SHMOOSHY ABOUT A BOY!!!

YAY!

I send you: croissants, cups that runneth over, a clearing of all clutter, corn chowder, convivial conversation, Crustos, contagious calm, catnaps, comrades, castling, a Craig Salkeld ballad, Caitlin's 'cwirks' and lots and lots and lots of that vitamin we call

C.

Chair Chocolates Calm Contention

Here are the things that saved me from my own bad mood:

First and foremost - a nap. I went immediately home and had a lie down.
Secondly - a world christmas concert in a dark, intimate theatre listening to carman sing and sing and sing.
Thirdly - a good night's sleep. naked.
Fourthly - getting a phone call from JH during a hot bath and hearing his tired voice fill my heart.
Fifthly - getting to work to find that Dario has left me many bags of Lindt chocolate on the seat of my desk chair... just because he takes joy in watching my confusion and ultimately my joy at receiving.
Sixthly - Emails from Jennie and Asha and many others reaching out to me inside my angry mood by posting comments to my blog that told me, above all else, that i am loved, unconditionally.

So, Tuesday begins and i start fresh, as we all must. I am blessed not to be a cow doctor. Amen.

Jessica - you asked me what it means to fall in love (appropriate question presently) and what i lie to myself about every day...

I think we call it falling because it is a surrender. I need only two things to occur to fall in love. I need to show up time and time again and when i speak, speak truth and when i kiss become that kiss. The other ingredient i need, personally, is to met in the same way time and time again. This sounds simple for two people to do, but it is rare. When you wake and find yourself suddenly sharing in this type of journey with someone, you begin that fall, and love catches you and there you are and there is nothing more lovely that you could have given yourself. I believe this comes first and it gives birth to the attraction and it gives birth to connection and it gives birth to sustainability...

I think i may be falling in love. More on that later...

What do i lie to myself about every day? That i have to get up and go to work and be responsible and be careful with how much i spend. That the mirror's obvious evidence states: my body is not perfect, my hair needs improvement, my teeth need straightening and that i should purchase an overpriced skin product to clear up my complexion. That i should not be falling for anyone right now, that i am too busy to care so deeply and that i shouldn't forgive myself ...yet...for how i hurt Aidan.

I don't believe i am rare in the amount of lies that i tell myself daily --- if you listen closely, you will be surprised how many of these untruths skip on through our thoughts. These days, luckily, i see them for what they are...lies...and i thank them for trying to keep me safe and then i send them on their way.

So today i send you: conquering crabiness, confidants, carman's crooning, complimentary anything, an inner-compass, collisions with cuties, a clitoral climax, clueing in, chuckles and chubby chicken.

...or perhaps chubby vegetarian-chicken...lol...

Oh, JH, how you affect me.

Candycanes and Coffee Filters

I am grump E.

I am not even really sure what has triggerred this bad mood. But i feel like crying. Or choking someone. I get off the phone with some totally innocent client, have a perfectly normal conversation and then slam down the receiver thinking 'fuck, buddy, really.' Even an email from Jordan hasn't cheered me up. I feel seperate, misunderstood and really really tired.

It's fascinating to observe, actually.

My weekend was this cloak of warm fuzz. I was the victim of cupid, sliding on rainbows and tightening on my paraglider in excitment to leap off the hugest of cliffs - even the one called falling in love. This weekend was perfect.

Then i come in today and everything starts off great...i am dipping a candycane into my tea and humming I'll Be Home For Christmas. But by 10am i am angry. We have run out of coffee filters and somehow this is prompting everyone to transfer their coffee-addicted aggression onto me. Everyone is sick, including she who covers my lunch shift so i get no break. I receive about 14 surveys to enter and respond to - up from a daily average of 2. And i am fully aware of the 23 errands i need to run without the time or energy to run them. Still. Usually this kind of stuff would roll off me, duck's back style. Don't know why right now i seethe. Why all i want is to crawl into bed and not emerge until this ugly cloud of blue and black washes away. Why and how so many people can live like this most of their lives...

So, in this less than attractive mood i send you: concerts at cultural centres, cupid's carress, change especially if massive, carrotjuice, coffee addiction support groups, CRM training, cousins on layovers, Chapters gift cards, a good CRY, Crunch Salsa-cardio CD-Roms...

Cha, cha, freakin' cha.

Countdown Continues

In 12 Days I will be sleeping in my childhood bed, safe in Moose Jaw.

Contentment. A couple of Saskatchewan visits ago, i visited Rochelle and Owen at their ranch and commented on what a lovely life they had created for themselves out there on the bald prairie. "Contentment, Krista," Rochelle responded, "It's called contentment. You should try it some time."

And i took her word for it and tried it and now i am getting to understand what a life, content, can feel like. Watching my contentment disappear this weekend was awful. I was suddenly Krista from 2000 - worried, afraid, snippy, exhausted. (It was interesting that this all happenned because something really great had just happenned to me...hmmmmmm). Thank Being, That Which Is, that i have walked through it and feel pretty firmly on the other side. This would not have happenned a year ago. I am back to contentment...relaxed in knowing that IT IS ALL GOING TO BE OK. Risks are perceived and there should be nothing scary about feeling

so damn good.

Caution, be damned!

I choose carefree instead of chained.

CARPE DIEM!

A helpful moment: went up to Grouse Mountain on Tuesday night in a blizzard. I had the winter parallel of my first Seawall walk. In the blizzard i found clarity and such a deep communion with being Canadian. I slipped and fell and laughed and sipped Hot Coco. I pressed my hands and face to the glass in the gondola and felt connected, calm, consoled. Thank you, Eric.

So, 12 days til flying home and 15 til Christmas and 1.5 hours til lunch and 34 hours until i see Jordan again and 26 hours until the Company Christmas party and 22 days until this crazy 2004 ceases to be....

But that is the future. Til then i send you: Compassion, a clear complexion, cookin' compilation CDs, Comfort Comfort Comfort, Chile con Carne, cocooning, closure for those of you who need it and for the rest of us...

Cloud 9.

Coconut

Coconut ball, coconut incense, coconut lotion.

That has been my morning.

That, and typing Capital Appreciation about 50 times.

In the spirit of capitializing on appreciation...

Things I Appreciate:

Dave Henwood -- he's this ridiculously friendly, funny man in my office with a Yorkshire (?) accent and a keen wit. he bubbles with positive energy. he just waved at me, through the glass door,wiggling his fingers and bouncing his eyebrows up and down. i appreciate dave.

Fries with Gravy and Ketchup - i don't eat them very often anymore, but today i flew back in time to U of T with Novie, Jackie and Terry and ordered one huge order of fries with gravy and ketchup. i was transported back to the wooded campus at Erindale and being 19 at the beginning of my new life in Ontario. sure the fries have made me nauseous, but, still, i appreciate a meal that can produce time travel.

I.T. Guys - my floppy disk got stuck in my computer this morning. seeing the IT giu arrive this morning was like hearing the fog horn on a large ship approach you after floating on your dingy for hours in the middle of the ocean. i was so glad to see him that i my eyes actually filled with tears. my heart, in rememberance, appreciates the IT Guys.

Lust - i know lust does not have the lasting effects of a friendship or a spiritual connection or even a solid companionship...but, i declare in this moment, lust is a rare vitamin that we could all benefit from in balanced doses. it heightens your senses, slams you directly into the middle of a Now moment and brings a whole new meaning to the word anticipation. now, mix it up with all that friendship, love, spirit stuff and your dead meat. the black sheep on the list, i say let us give lust a little more appreciation.

Hippiedom - to those that name their children Sky, Forest, Hope, River, Hart. to those who wear beaded hemp jewellery, hang out with their friends in the nude and would rather live peacefully than shop at Pottery Barn. to those who touch a part of me who has always dreamed of living in a magic cottage in the woods, arms wrapped around someone i love as we nap in a hammock on the water - i appreciate you.

Eleventy Gillion - i appreciate this phrase because it made me laugh so hard the first time i read it that a looming grumpy mood that i was almost going to have completely disappeared. i challange each of you to use it in a sentence at least once this week...if not an eleventy gillion times. (krista grins in appreciation).

To top it off i send you: clapping versus booing, cushions-many and overstuffed, condoms because no one wants clymita, chutzpah, Cinnamon Toast Crunch, calling cards that never run out, calanders from your fedex guy,cuddles and crayola crayons...

...biggie sized with the sharpener in the back.

Conflict

I can do one of three things:

Show up.

Run.

Show up kinda while making sure the entire time that one foot is firmly planted outside of the proverbial door.

The latter feels familiar, the middle - tempting and the top one...well, it is Who I Want To Be.

I know you assume i am talking about a guy - and i am - but i am also talking about so many different areas of my life.

For the last while i have very much been on top of my demanding Ego voice. I was observing it, thanking it for doing what it thought was necessary and then usually choosing to walk away from its advice. But now my Ego voice has grabbed me by the shoulders and is shaking me and screaming. And i...i am inside of it - the fear, this voice, drowning.

What keeps me above water? The isolated moments that Now overtakes me and i am intensely aware of his whistle, the buzz of the kitchen outside his door, the braveness in his eyes that stare at me and say - i am not going anywhere. If and when i can 'lose' myself i am gloriously happy and all is well. Then the voice says...'ok, krista. enough'. And my hand is on his chest and i am pushing him away and i am trapped and drowning...

Exhausting.

I am now consumed with wanting to know where this comes from. This is just a dense version of the liquid form that has trickled through so many of my choices, especially concerning men.

Wanna know something else interesting? This kind of panic/fear/stress makes me want to eat.

Holy, Konkin, one word. Therapy. LOL.

I send you: calm Chinese guys on commuter buses, carrots for cravings, cider - hot and applely, catch-up naps, community, copious amounts of chick-peas, chamomile tea on the couch, cats named jack and especially ...clarity.

Just opened up a book and the first sentence i saw was..."stop treating everything like an emergency"...

hmmm. i think i've been told.

Corporate Clothing and the Continuation

Is it normal to feel like bearing the children of a man you have yet to kiss?
Or is that just called 'rushing it'?

LOL.

This morning i decided to finally partake in the Casual Friday phenomenon. I picked out a great sweater and pulled on a funky pair of jeans and drove to pick up Ryan for work. He took one look at me and asked me if i had not gotten the email last week about how jeans are no longer allowed at 20/20. I obviously had not, but it was too late. I arrived at work, full of embarassment and apology and was sent home to change. Yes, that is right, i was sent home to change. Thing is i found it all really funny. Not irritated in the least.

Wonder why i am in such a good mood?

Could it be that i see Mr. Lewin tonight? That he has sent me the most delicious emails all
week - sweet and smart and funny and very honest? Could it be the anticipation of finding out if last weekend was a perfect dream or my actual life? Could it be?

Change of subject...another C word...councellor.

I am seeing her again starting tonight. People keep asking me - why do you need to see a councellor, you're so happy, it's sickening! But people sometimes don't see (C?)...perhaps that is WHY i am so happy, because i understand that happiness is a choice and healing is an action. I also need to point out that i, too, still deal with all the issues that have grown up with me - the absence of a father, abandonment, abnormal need for attention, hyper-critical tendencies, control, jealousy, fear...

For example, i have a belief, small and insidious, that says - Krista hurts good men.

Which is now rearing its ugly head, sensing, of course, that i have just met the best of the best. I can feel the creeping desire to self-destruct this-which-feels-good and protect him (and me) before i do something horrible.

See, there is always healing to do be done. And so off to the councellor i go. HAHAAH, i just thought of something...her name is Cindy. How perfect.

And i will try to not self-destruct, by simply turning away from the poisonous thoughts and focusing on the ways i have and do bring joy to the men in my life. By focusing on the Now and getting to know, slowly and gently, the miracle of this new connection.

I send you: Classic movies like Casablanca, Colorado anything, casual fridays that work, crackling fires, credit line increases, confidence that you are, in fact, on the right path...

...even if it IS north up Sherbourne.

C

This is the month of Christmas and i now dedicate it to words beginning with C.

Duane OKane's talk last night inspired me to this realization.
I want to be these 3 things:

Conscious. Creative. Curious.

In Duane's opinion THE most important thing one can be is curious. Interested.
I say, amen.

Another C word that i have come to love:

Choice.

An interesting thing happenned yesterday. I left my purse on my desk (as always) and was off with the maintenance guy talking about our temperature problems. When i came back, a woman from the office was standing beside my desk with my purse in her hand and a look of horror on her face. "DO NOT LEAVE YOUR PURSE OUT IN THE OPEN KRISTA, " she admonished me, "THERE IS THEFT IN THIS BUILDING. IT IS VERY UNSAFE!" She was visible shaken at the extreme lack of concern about my stuff. I smiled and thanked her for her advice, but when she saw that i was not sorry, she kept on. "SERIOUSLY KRISTA! WHAT IF YOUR WALLET WAS STOLEN?? YOU CAN'T BE SO TRUSTING!" At this point other workers had emerged from their offices and were bonding as a tribe, starting to tut-tut my carelessness and share their stories of theft and heartbreak. Then i said something that shut them all up and most likely aided in their conclusion that i am - point blank - Crazy.

"You guys don't get it," i said, "people don't steal from me."

And i meant it. It seems ridiculous to me to think that some random monster of a person would come up to our floor, into our office, reach over my counter and steal from my purse. I have total faith that my purse is completely safe. That i am safe. That there is nothing to fear. Call me Crazy. This is what i know. And so it is.

I send you cookies and crystal skies, caramel chocolate, chiropractors and candle light, caroling with a Cory, a safe cry, Chai lattes, a hearty congratulations and close contact with All That Is.

Cheers!