Day 1263: Voices

Here’s what my voice wants to voice about “Voices” today:

1. I’m trying out for The Voice in New York City this weekend.
2. When I’m in New York, I shall hear the familiar voice of my son Aaron and also the new voice of a blogger whose voice I cherish on WordPress.
3. 49 beautiful voices were silenced, too soon, by gunfire in Orlando last weekend.
4. This week, I’ve heard many voices in therapy discussing the mass shooting in Orlando.
5. Many voices joined together on the U.S. Senate floor yesterday, crying out against gun policies in my country.
6. On September 21, I’m having open heart surgery in Minnesota, which will most likely interrupt my voice here on WordPress. However, my boyfriend Michael’s voice will continue my unbroken streak of what will then be over thirteen hundred consecutive daily blog voicings.
7. Today,  there will be a phone call containing the voices of my long-time cardiologist Dr. Deeb Salem and the Mayo Clinic cardiologist Dr. Carole Warnes — both of whom hold my heart in their hands.
8. Yesterday, I heard Dr. Salem’s voice say this at Boston’s Tufts Medical Center: “You’ll feel like you’ve been hit by a truck” after September’s valve replacement surgery — a voicing I appreciate much more than all the voices I’ve heard lately downplaying how invasive this operation actually is.
9. Sometimes I’ve judged my own voice as too soft, too loud, not strong enough and not good enough. I feel more secure in my own voice, every day.
10. Judgment squelches voices.
11. I value authentic voices.

Yesterday, I heard many voices at two different hospitals, near Fenway Park,  and at a PetSmart.  Can you hear any of those voices in my photos?

 

Do any of those voices resonate with you, here and now?

Here are some voices evoked by this post (on Youtube here and here):

WTF!  I hope I hear many of your voices in comments about my blogging voice today.

I shall now voice my gratitude towards all those who helped me bring together all the voices in this post and to you — of course! –for your valuable, authentic voice.

Day 1206: What is your style?

My style is to notice what’s going on around me, and I notice that “style” usually  refers to external appearances, including clothes people wear and how they wear them.

As a group and individual psychotherapist, I often use the word “style” about people’s internal processes, including their typical  ways of

• communicating,
• learning,
• decision making, and
• other reflections of the way they think, feel, and experience the world.

Because my blogging style includes checking to see whether I’ve explored a topic before, I’ve now discovered two other stylin’ posts, here and here.  Because I tend to prefer a modest style, I will not brag about the content of those previous posts, but rather humbly suggest that you might find some merit in them.

I think it’s helpful to recognize and own your personal style, in order to understand inevitable differences between that style and other people’s styles.  Therefore, I will attempt to list other aspects of my natural style:

• spontaneous
• direct
• honest
• inclusive
• anxious
• curious
• sensitive
• inquisitive
• shy
• creative
• random
• intuitive
• impatient

I include “impatient” because I’m impatient and eager to move on from styling that list.

If creating lists is your natural style, what list might you create about your natural style?

I got a lot of compliments on my fashion  style as I shared 45 seconds of musical stylings during an audition for “The Voice” in Philadelphia, two months ago:

I’m likely to show a very different style when I try, try again in another Open Audition for “The Voice” on June 18, in New York City.

Because my style is to pack a lot into every blog post, I would also like to include a story about different styles, from yesterday.

When I walk to work every morning, I pass by this stylish yellow moped:

The more I look at that, the more I am convinced that is the very same moped I owned for several decades. Yes, it used to be my style to commute on a yellow moped during the 1970s and 1980s.   When we moved to our current  stylish residence about five years ago, I gave that moped to one of the movers, because I knew it was no longer my style to ride it.

Yesterday morning, I decided to investigate further and to find out who has been styling around Boston on my beloved yellow moped. I walked into the construction site  next to where that styling moped is parked.

Allow me to style the resulting dialog, as follows:

Me (to burly construction worker):  Hi!  I was looking for the owner of that yellow moped parked outside.

Construction worker: I doubt it’s any of my guys, but I’ll check.  HEY!  YELLOW MOPED?

Other construction worker (immediately):  Yep.  That’s mine.

Me (thrilled):  Really?

Construction worker:  NO!

As is my style, I then laughed out loud, realizing that a yellow moped does NOT fit the style of most Boston construction workers.

Here are all the stylish photos I took yesterday:

I hope your natural style includes expressing yourself in a comment below.

Thanks to all who have their own natural styles, including you!

 

Day 1173: Feeling lucky?

Feeling lucky?

I’m feeling lucky.

I feel lucky that, every day, I find lucky inspirations for my lucky blog posts, like this lucky sign I saw early yesterday on a lucky Saint Patrick’s Day morning:

Even though I didn’t win a prize from any pots of gold, I feel lucky that:

• I’ve got a lucky number of consistent and kind readers here at lucky WordPress.
• I do group and individual therapy at a luckily large and well-known teaching hospital in lucky Boston, Massachusetts, USA.
• My lucky 18 year old son, Aaron, is luckily healthy, happy, and wise.
• My lucky boyfriend Michael is lucky enough to have met lucky me.
• I’m seeing my lucky cardiologist, Dr. Mark Estes, today, who luckily knows more about pacemakers than almost anybody else in this lucky world of ours.
• Today is Friday, which makes a lot of working people feel lucky.

On lucky Thursdays, I am lucky enough to facilitate two therapy groups. Here are all the other photos I was lucky enough to capture yesterday, in lucky chronological order:

 

While I didn’t order Lucky Hydrox yesterday, I was still lucky enough to

sing from my heart, as I was walking to and from my lucky workplace.

Here’s one lucky song I was lucky enough to be singing, yesterday, with all my heart:

When I sang “Soothe” on my tryout for The Voice  last month, I wasn’t lucky enough to make it to the show. However, next month I’ll be lucky enough to sing “Soothe” for my fellow social workers at our lucky yearly party.

Maybe you’ll be lucky enough to see and hear a recording of me singing it, here.

I hope I’m lucky enough to get lots of lucky comments today.

Lucky thanks to all my lucky readers!

Day 1156: Someday I’ll look back on this and ….

Someday I’ll look back on this post and …. what?

• Laugh?
• Cry?
• Have other emotions?
• Be proud?
• Wish I’d written something else?
• Be content with it?
• Remember exactly what was happening when I wrote it?

Someday I’ll look back on this cartoon …

… and remember how I found it, yesterday, in a copy of The New Yorker.

Now that I’ve returned to work after my winter vacation and I’m telling people about my  try-out for “The Voice” (among other adventures), I have yet to say …

Someday I’ll look back on this and laugh.

Why?  Because I’m already laughing.

Some day I’ll look back on this whole experience with “The Voice” and remember how it inspired me to:

• take risks,
• build my confidence,
• improve my singing, and
• express more of myself.

Someday you’ll look back on this post and remember some photo I snapped yesterday at work. I wonder which one it will be?

Someday, I’ll look back on “Whip It” by Devo, inspired by those last two photos.

Today’s the day!

Today, I look back on all this and thank my co-worker Susan (who has great stuff at her desk and also sends me more great stuff through interoffice mail) and you — of course! — for looking back on my blog, here and now.

Day 1145: Comparisons

When I woke up this morning in my incomparable friend Jeanette’s home in Philadelphia, I knew today’s blog post would be called “Comparisons.”

Comparing myself to other human beings, I think we all do many comparisons, every day,  including:

• Comparisons of ourselves to other people.
• Comparisons of the present to the past.
• Comparisons of reality to what we think should be.

How would you compare my comparatively short list of common comparisons to comparisons you’ve noticed?

Compared to other definitions, here’s how “Comparisons” are defined in my list of Cognitive Distortions (Automatic and Unhelpful Thoughts):

Comparisons.
We compare ourselves to others, with ourselves coming out short. For example, “I’m not as smart (or good, competent, good-looking, lovable, etc.) as that other person.” Or, we compare ourselves to how we think we should be, or how we’ve been before. We might think that comparisons help motivate us, but they usually make us feel worse.

Comparing this to other blog posts I’ve written, I need to include:

1. an explanation of why “Comparisons” was on my mind when I woke up.  In two days, I’ll be trying out for “The Voice,” where my voice will be compared to thousands of others.
2. photos, which could be compared to each other and/or to other photos you’ve seen.

I am now comparing the size of two of those photos, above,  to what I want them to be.  Here are the two Rumi quotes on Jeanette’s kitchen cabinets, comparatively larger, so you can compare them:

How would you compare this post to others?

Many thanks to Jeanette, to Rumi, and to my readers, all beyond compare.

Day 1144: O…K… Ready

O…K… Ready-ers — I mean, Readers — are you ready for this?

O…K… I saw that ready carpet cleaner yesterday, at work. And while the carpet in my office does need cleaning, I wasn’t ready to use it.  Why?  Because I was getting ready to leave for my vacation to Philadelphia and New York City.

O…K… I’m ready for my train trip to Philly to see my bff Jeanette and to try out for “The Voice” on Sunday.

O…K…what helps me be ready?

To be as much as possible in the moment, letting go of unhelpful memories and thoughts and letting go of worry about the future.

O…K… Ready for the other new photos on my iPhone?

O…K… WordPress peeps, what helps you be ready?

O…K… Ready to give thanks and to go! Have a nice day

Day 1143: What to do, what to do

What to do, what to do for my blog post today?

What to do, what to do is share my Facebook post, from last night:

I sang one-minute versions of my three “Voice” try-out songs at a staff meeting today, asking people to choose what they preferred. The results were shocking! 0 votes for “Lion Sleeps Tonight.” 4 votes for “Mad World.” 12 votes for “Soothe” (which nobody had ever heard before). What to do, what to do …

What to do, what to do?  My Facebook friends asked me to let them express their opinions about to do, what to do for my “Voice” audition this Sunday.  What I did, what I did is to post one-minute versions of me singing “Mad World” and “Soothe” on Facebook.

What to do, what to do when my Facebook friends voted overwhelmingly for “Mad World”?

What to do, what to do with all this conflicting data?

Here are my suggestions, for myself, about what to do, what to do:

• Continue to practice one-minute versions of those songs, getting better, getting better.
• Ask for  more opinions about what to do, what to do for my audition.
• Let go, let go of any belief that there is ONE RIGHT WAY to do this audition.
• Have fun, have fun with the process.
• Give myself credit, give myself credit FOR SINGING IN FRONT OF MY CO-WORKERS yesterday, with no fear, no fear.
• Have no fear, no fear about any outcome of my audition for “The Voice” on Sunday.
• Let go of shame, of shame about any “mistakes” or “rejections.”
• Follow my intuition in the moment, in the moment.
• Realize my self-worth, my self-worth is not dependent upon getting a call-back from “The Voice.”
• Affirm that my voice, my voice deserves to be heard, no matter what the outcome.
• Resolve that I will do more singing, do more singing no matter what happens.

What to do, what to do with these new photos from yesterday?

What to do, what to do to explain those photos?

• What to do, what to do when the temperatures in Boston rise 50 degrees in 36 hours?
• What to do, what to do when you have a wonderful co-worker who sends you great stuff through inter-office mail?
• What to do, what to do in a therapy group about sensitivities?
• What to do, what to do about my drawing of “The Princess and the Pea”?

What to do, what to do? How about making a to do, a to do with a comment from you?

What to do, what to do, now that this post is through?  I’ll just give thanks to you, to you.

 

Day 1142: All you need

All you need to know about today’s title is that I saw it in a supermarket last night.

Is that all you need?  I need more, including  an explanation of why and how Lane Ground Biscuits are all I need.

Writing my blog post each day is all I need to get going every morning.

Many people believe that all you need is right there, in every present moment.

When I go into a room at the Philadelphia Convention Center on February 21, with many other people, to try out for “The Voice,” all I need is this:

When I’m breathing in to sing, I will remember to take in all I need from the universe, including the good wishes of my family, friends, and readers.

All I need, now, is to see if the  photos I took yesterday are all we need, for this blog post.

 

 

All I need, in order to finish packing for my train trip on Thursday, is to get Oscar off my suitcase.

What is all you need, in the present moment?

All I need to end this post is to thank all of those who helped me write it and all of you, no matter what your needs are.

 

Day 1141: What do I look and sound like when …?

What do I look and sound like when there’s less than one week before I go to an Open Audition for “The Voice” in Philadelphia?

What do I look and sound like when I’m going up and down between insecurity and confidence?

What do I look and sound like when I’m having trouble getting enough sleep?

What do I look and sound like when I am ….

• down to earth?

• blatant?

• stupid?

• bitching?

• drunk (even though I don’t drink alcohol)?

• filled with resolve?

• doing the math?

• cold?

• fun to know and easy to love?

• ducky?

• and, most importantly, singing?

What do I look and sound like when you comment on my blog?

Happy.

I’m looking and sounding grateful, here and now, as I finish this post.

Day 1139: Wanted

I wanted to title this post “wanted” after I saw this Wanted Poster at my wanted job, yesterday:

I saw that Wanted Poster yesterday while I was doing something I’ve wanted to do for a while:  sing my three possible audition songs for “The Voice” to people who wanted to hear them.   I asked  those people at work, “Which song might make me most wanted by the judges?”   People who wanted to hear all three songs yesterday wanted to tell me their wanted preferences, as follows:

“Mad World” was wanted by 15 people.

“The Lion Sleeps Tonight” was wanted by 5 people.

“Soothe” was wanted by 5 people.

I wanted a clear majority, so I now want to sing “Mad World” for my February 21 audition. (That’s the song WordPresser vanbytheriver has stated that she’s wanted me to sing.) If I’m wanted back, as I’ve wanted, to perform more audition songs for “The Voice,”  I’ll sing all three of those wanted songs.

In case you wanted to see other photos I wanted to take yesterday, here they are:

 

 

I wanted to point out that the cat at the PetSmart shelter  was named “Michael,” just like my boyfriend. Michael wanted to take Michael home last night, but he knew that Oscar, Harley, and my wanted son Aaron haven’t wanted a third cat in the house.

I wonder whether this post is what you wanted today.

Before I end, I wanted to thank all who helped me create this “Wanted” post and also you — of course! — for wanting to read it.