On Minors and Gender Issues

Posted on by Esterina Francesca

I’m not a bigot in any way. I feel alive and love when people are who they are inherently. I can tell when they are being something other than themselves and it bothers me because it feels inauthentic.

I am ecstatic to live in a period of time where you can love anyone who you connect with openly and free. Maybe we aren’t completely there yet, but we are way closer than we have ever been in history. And we continue to progress everyday.

In this time period there is also a controversy over medical care and human rights. Particularly gender dysphoria. This part I don’t understand. 

Regardless of any health issue that arises, we should always try the least invasive solutions before diving into something unknown or irreversible. It’s not only the right thing for our bodies, it’s socially responsible for the cost of healthcare. 

To be clear I am not opposed to any kind of lifestyle and/or partner of any possible combination. 

And if there is no other solution one tries for being comfortable in your skin other than modifying your body with surgery or medicine, then I support whatever it takes to ensure that we are comfortable expressing ourselves as who we are.

To be clear however, I am opposed to this as a first solution or any solution for minors. Particularly for minors. 



I just don’t get what the controversy is about on gender altering for minors. 

Why can’t we buy cigarettes until the age of 21? 

We’ve made this restriction because we believe says we aren’t wise enough to make the decision to do something potentially harmful to our bodies. We KNOW it’s harmful and a risk. My mom died of lung cancer at the age of 49 from smoking. It’s bad for us. But there are people who live well into their 90s smoking everyday and don’t pass from smoking issues. It’s a risk. 

Same with 21 as the age limit for alcohol and in states where it’s legal – Marijuana. Risks.  Being old enough to decide to take the risk. Alcoholism runs in my family. I myself need to stay dry because it affects me in very negative ways. 

What about car and vacation home rentals? Many have age limits of 25. No one is arguing with these. Young people in general are a risk for so many reasons. Too many to list. Most of the time it has to do with making decisions that as you get older you wouldn’t otherwise take.

Why can’t we vote until the age of 18? Or even get a tattoo? Or enlist in the military? Because our brains are not yet developed and we aren’t yet wise or experienced enough to think things through or make major decisions.

These age limits are universal. As you get older you can rationalize more clearly, understand your emotions and make better decisions than a 16 year old may.

We have a legal obligation to our children until the age of 18. An obligation to protect them, not just cater to their wishes. We don’t cater to them because they are not old enough to know their own minds yet. We should absolutely support and let them try out things they would like to explore. But I would draw the line at permanent body changes. Using the line “but I know my child” is not possible because if the child isn’t old enough by every law to even vote, they can’t know their own mind- so how could a parent?  

Related, but unrelated…. Weight loss surgery. Pediatric weight loss surgery is not common. It happens but it is uncommon. There are strict prerequisites for it. Those prerequisites are family support/community in place, the requirement that all other medically supervised diets and exercises have failed over the course of 6 months to a year, and mental health pre-op. Plus – the adolescent has to have a BMI of 40 or more. 

Even grown adults have these guidelines. 

So I have to ask why is it controversial to put an age limit on gender altering drugs and surgeries? 

These children cannot even vote, let alone buy a cigarette. We all agree they are not old enough to make decisions good for them or society, so why is it so controversial that they wait until at least the age of 18?

Why are we scared that adult rights are being taken away when we put parameters in place to limit gender altering drugs/surgeries on adults too? Parameters like medically supervised alternatives first and the requirement for emotional support and counseling, before and after? How different is it from bariatric surgery? 

I think these are important considerations and that law makers are being responsible with our healthcare dollars by putting these laws in place. Children are not able to vote or buy mind altering substances for a reason. So why are we even having the discussion about body altering? 

I’m not a bigot. I am just asking. We need to be able to ask questions without being seen as a bigot. 

Enlighten me so I can help support positive societal change too.

On Self-Compassion

Posted on by Esterina Francesca

This morning I spent a little time creating a short yoga class that I will be providing at work on Monday. The Employee Health program is focusing on Self-Compassion and holding some events and classes that support this important concept.

From the definition on the Employee Health flier: Self-Compassion is the ability to turn compassion inward toward oneself, especially when we believe we fail, make a mistake or feel inadequate. 

How often do we focus on our heart? Take a moment to think about this amazing organ that relentlessly beats and gives you life.

Consider what your heart would tell your brain when you are down or have a negative dialogue ruminating in your head.

The heart generates 2-3 watts of energy through an electrical stimulus called the sinus node (or SA node). Your heart is the only thing in your body that generates its own electrical current from seemingly nowhere.

Where does this electricity comes from?

It is said the heart is connected to a larger energetic field linked to the universe.

Decade long studies show the heart has it’s own intelligence, neurological system and electromagnetic field. Additionally, these studies show that the heart’s intelligence is actually much larger and more powerful than the brain’s. Reference

We aren’t taught to consult the heart as a center of intelligence. If you listen to your heart, what would it tell you about self-compassion?

Consider self compassion and the way you treat yourself. How do you feel when a mistake was made, something didn’t happen that you wished would or your own level of adequacy? How does your heart feel about it? It is still in there beating, loving you and providing life for you.

As you go about the rest of the day and month where the American Heart Association focus’ on heart health, consider committing to catching yourself anytime you might not be as loving to yourself as your heart wishes it might be.

Be your own Valentine and treat yourself with kindness, compassion and understanding just the way your own beating heart does for you.

Namaste

Esterina

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On Non Alcoholic Beverages

Posted on by Esterina Francesca

20 months and counting. This is just my point of view and may not be suitable for all.

10/9/22

Today is 20 months without alcohol for me.

I’ve learned a lot about myself in the last 20 months, particularly about drinking. 

I love to drink. Not just alcohol. Beverages. All kinds. Coffee, tea, sparkling water, soda (diet ONLY), Crystal Lite… and now non alcoholic (NA) beer.

I’ve always loved the taste of beer. I think my first experience of beer was when I was around 7 or so. My family and I were coming back from a Sunday afternoon of fishing off the piers of Brooklyn NY.  We didn’t plan to stay out that long and we had nothing to drink. I was soooo thirsty. 

On the way home we stopped for a family favorite- pizza at Spumoni Gardens. My dad stood on the pizza line with my brothers and my mom and I on the drink line. The beer for my father came out first. I had been complaining for hours about being thirsty. The soda was taking entirely too much time. My mom handed me the beer and said “just a sip”. I took the flimsy wax coated cup off the tray and intended to take one gulp, but promptly downed the entire thing. My mom looked at me with horror. 

“You liked that?” she asked?

“Yes, I was thirsty” I replied.

The workers behind the counter handed us the sodas and the pressure of the line moved us out to the general courtyard where we sat with my dad and brothers.

My mom was still shocked when she said “I need to go back online to get the beer, Esterina drank it all”.

The rest of my family stared at me in awe. Everyone asking how I could have liked the taste. 

Geez, I was just thirsty and it quenched my thirst is all. I didn’t understand the big deal.

I had also danced for 10 years. 2-3 times a week for most of the school year I would put on a pink leotard for ballet lessons and the black one for tap and jazz. I was always concious of how that leotard fit. As I got older and started filling out more, I started to think about calories and the things I liked. I always loved soda and when I realized that diet soda tasted almost exactly the same I decided to never have non diet soda again.

I may have had non diet soda once or twice since then (I honestly can’t say), but it’s diet soda for me now. At least for the past 35 years it has been. 

As a young adult I never chose alcohol as a beverage of choice unless it was some fruity elaborate cocktail on a beach somewhere. Even then I’d only have one – completely aware of the sheer number of calories the drink had.

But sometime in my early 30s there was nothing but non diet soda and beer as an option with pizza somewhere after helping some friends move. I was hot, hungry and thirsty. I wouldn’t drink the soda but had the lite beer instead. Less calories.

And oh my gosh was it good! Beer and pizza together was amazing. It was Miller lite that our friends bought. So the next Friday for pizza night I picked up a six pack of Miller lite. Light beer became a part of my life. 

Well, fast forward a few years. I met my now husband who introduced me to enjoying the subtleties of wine. That was a new area for me. Wine isn’t so easy to just have 1 when there is a whole bottle involved. The addiction took hold from there. Light beer went to all kinds and a little wine too way too much. 

Now I’m 20 months from my last drink and am as happy as I’ve ever been. I don’t miss anything about it. But I do have to give a giant plug to NA beer. I love it! I love it like I love diet soda. All of my life since I switched to diet soda I just don’t even like the taste of regular soda. It’s so sweet my teeth hurt. When it’s the only option I’ve often taken a sip to be polite but let the cup sit full. 

When I first got sober, one day after gardening I craved beer. It has long been a go to after a very hot day or long hours of work. I remembered we had NA beer in the fridge. But I opted for the diet soda instead. It was just as refreshing. 

The next day I started telling this same story to one of the Aware Recovery companions that came to my house as part of the year long program I admitted myself to. When I got to the part where I remembered there was NA beer in the fridge she stopped me with some kind of urgency and almost yelled “You didn’t have any did you?!”. 

No I replied- taken aback that she perceived I nearly avoided a relapse. What did I know? Was NA beer a gateway to drinking again? It seemed to be!

A few days later I told another companion who was at the house about this treacherous near miss. This one told me that despite being in recovery, she is a bartender and has NA beer and mocktails all of the time. She treated the episode as no big deal. 

I didn’t comment. I needed to mull this over. Maybe it was one of these things where there is no hard and fast rule. To each their own. 

No one talked about NA drinks in AA. My husband ended up buying a few varieties to try himself and they were always around the house. But it wasn’t until about a year ago this month that I dared try one. 

At my first sip I was convinced I had beer. I had to go to the fridge and read the can. It wasn’t one of these 0.0% things. I did claim it was <0.5%. Again I was scared about this little amount. I looked it up and read there is no way anyone can get drunk from that amount. You need to drink 40 for any kind of buzz. Your body processes this tiny amount so quickly that even if you could injest 480 oz in any short period of time, you still can’t get inerbriared.

Inebriation-proof and tastes this good? It seemed as too good to be true as the Diet Coke I still love. 

I started drinking them and trying different kinds. They are so good. To me as good as the real thing, but no buzz. No risk of slurring or not being able to drive. 

Nothing came up on my very frequent urine tests with Aware, the breathalyzer or at the addiction treatment center I went to for Vivitrol shots. 

It took me weeks to even think about telling the third companion that I was drinking NA beer. She was the youngest of the group and seemed to be the most receptive to such an alternative thought. As soon as I told her she piped up that she still goes to bars with friends and drinks soda or whatever non alcoholic cocktail might be advertised on the menu. She has been doing that for years and never felt tempted.

Not long after another companion was added to my dwindling # of visits (because I was nearing the end of the program) and this one had a whole list of NA cocktails up her sleeve. Additionally she didn’t get the AA word that drinking any of these out of a wine glass was the road to ruin, so my guilt about even entertaining such a thought went out the window. 

Now I am not saying this is ok for everyone- to have NA drinks, beers or mocktails. Or to have them in traditional drinking cups. Perhaps if I didn’t take that pause when that first companion sort of scared me. Perhaps that may have quickly put me somewhere bad. I’ll never know. 

It’s often not possible to know when you made the right choice. Usually you know when you made the wrong one.

But I’m still not saying it’s a great idea or alternative for everyone. It might not be. I am not an expert and the only experience I’ve had is my own short lived one. 

Not long ago I opened the question about yes/no to NA beverages to the local town Facebook recovery group I am in… and if one could get their proverbial head bitten off I would have. Glad I only asked and didn’t tell them I did!! Not one person (not 1) thought it a good idea. 

The two biggest comments were

1- when did we ever drink for the taste?

2- mimicking the real thing will lead back to the real thing.

And I think that might be true for some people. But not all. 

Everyone thinks they are different or immune to whatever the warning is. I took pause here and evaluated. 

I’ve always had good discipline when it came to food/drinks/calories. I do realize that drugs and alcohol are a different story and their addictive qualities make that nearly impossible to control. 

But I am not having the real thing and there is nothing addictive to it. 

I’ve always been ok with knock off food versions. My Diet Coke as an example, but so much more. I switched to skim milk in high school when I had money from a job and a car to buy the milk. We only had whole milk at home. Did it taste as good?? No of course not. But it was better for me and good enough. Now I prefer it. But I don’t even drink milk anymore- only almond milk. Another switch that wasn’t as good at first but my now preference.

Same with sugar substitutes. I never minded snackwells or those fake types of sweets. I prefer making them myself. Yes, like the beer they taste a little different- but not much. These kind of things satisfy me without the guilt and over time I don’t even like the original anymore. The same has been true for me all my life from the milk down to tofu over meat. 

So in answer to the responses to my question in the Facebook recovery page, I did drink for the taste and never has the fake version led me back to the real thing. When I switched I switched for good.

It’s been a full year now since I dipped my toe into NA beverages. So far I don’t feel any closer to a road to ruin.  Do I miss wine? Not really. There are zero good subs for it and in the face of that reality and I am not even interested.

I haven’t really gotten very into mocktails – for the same reasons I never did before on hard cocktails or hard alcohol. The calories don’t seem worth it. 

The growth of NA beer is pretty astounding. It is available everywhere. The only place I haven’t come across it is in the Bahamas. But everywhere else I have been since in the world, it’s readily available.

What makes it even more fun is the lack of too many options. There are 1-3 available choices TOPS. So I get to try the one or three varieties and never feel like I’m missing out on the dozen more I could have tried like I often felt with the real wine or beer I drank too much of.

The truth is I love to drink. I like lots of drinks. I love the taste of beer and I can have that taste without the consequences. It’s a chance I was willing to take and knock on wood it’s been a gift!

Not for a second in the 20 months and counting now did I feel like I was missing out on a things. I feel great and I love my life. I love my life without alcohol.

Yeah

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On the Importance of Food, Shelter and Clothing

Posted on by Esterina Francesca

Most mornings and evenings I walk with my husband and our beloved black lab mix – Koji. In the morning with limited time, we walk down the shore and back and observe the day awaken. In the evenings we take a longer walk. Depending on the time of year we are catching the height of the evening’s festivities, the daily wind down, or the flat out night in our neighborhood (summer to winter span).

This morning it is late September. The air is cool and I wore my lightweight, dark blue rain coat I purchased in Maine a few years during an unexpected rain storm while in Perkins Cove.

I already had my morning coffee. I wasn’t yet hungry. I was not stressing about what may be in my work inbox. My life felt content and I was alive.

So very alive that my senses were more open. 

I felt the crisp autumn air around me. I held my arms out and inhaled deep breaths. A few times in the past week or so I was able to detect the smell of wood burning in a nearby fireplace. 

I heard the dog sniffing. I heard the squirrels shuffling across the grass and their tiny feet crunching the dried fallen leaves. I heard water from the shore in the distance. I heard a lot of bird signals and whistles . Mingled into it all were the sound of crickets and other unidentified woodland creatures. I closed my eyes to help my ears hear all. What a song!

As we approached the shore I noticed the early morning light dancing across the water. The sun hadn’t quite made its way above the horizon. But the light was creating a spectacular palette of color nonetheless. 

I didn’t have my phone and asked my husband for his. I snapped a short video of the rippling water and rising sun. It looked beautiful through the camera, but more beautiful in real life. Nothing captures the moment like living, breathing and appreciating the actual moment.

On the way back home I contemplated nature with teaming life around me. I’ve been wanting to go back to being vegan. I do not need to eat so much. Some people have no healthy or good food options. Others have no food at all. 

This got me thinking… How can you have an appreciation for life when you are hungry? When your body is so primed to keep itself alive it is not thinking about other lives. It is telling you to feed it. 

Sometimes I walk at lunch. Almost always after dinner. I thought about how I don’t always enjoy these walks so much. When I am not dressed right, when I am in rush and worried about getting back to my computer, or when I am thirsty or hungry and fantasizing about what to eat or drink when I get back home is when I enjoy these walks the least. 

I like every other human feel content when I have food, shelter and clothing. Next up Maslow’s pyramid is safety. 

For years I did not feel psychologically ‘safe’ with my husband. For reasons that belong to another blog his perception of how to approach the issues in our lives brought a proverbial fire alarm in me. When I worry about work or the kids or when I don’t feel psychologically safe, the ability to have my senses pick out subtle sounds and visual nuances are dulled. I don’t notice what the dog is doing if I am walking him, and then I’ll subsequently feel annoyed with him. I’m not present to those walks or my life when I don’t have the bottom of the pyramid covered.

As we continued home this morning I contemplated how I felt safe. Safe with my husband who at that very moment of my quite contemplation seemed to sense just that by reaching down to gently place my hand into his. I felt safe with him and in my neighborhood. 

How can anyone feel safe living in the ‘hood’ just a few miles down the road? How can you feel like the world is beautiful when outside your window is nothing more than buildings that block the sun? Where there might be a dangerous concrete jungle? Where the sound of birds and crickets is overtaken by honking horns, someone yelling, loud street signs and overall chaos?  If your walk to school or commute to work is fraught with fear and anxiety about being safe and what may greet you when you get there, how can you be comfortable and take a moment to appreciate life. 

How can anyone thrive without life’s basics? 

A flower cannot grow without a medium, sun and water.

A human cannot flourish without food, shelter, clothing and safety. 

They just can’t.

Anyone who says we live in the land of the free and that anyone can make it is naïve. 

I’d like to think that too, but people who don’t feel safe at home or anywhere in their surroundings during their day-to-day life are not free. They are a prisoner of their own heightened senses that are keeping them alive. When a human is hungry, they cannot think of anything else but how to eat. When we are cold or too hot, our body turns down our other senses off to divert energy into keeping us alive. No shelter or an uncomfortable sleeping arrangement leads to sleep deprivation. No one thrives when their body is too tired to function.

I personally don’t know what to do other than what I already try to do. But I want to do more.

If you feel you have food, shelter, clothing and psychological safety at the moment – perhaps just take a few seconds to stop and think about one thing you can do to lift the consciousness of others so they can be happier and more productive members of society too. 

This morning I appreciated life. I wanted to be better, do better, go vegan. I felt that way because my needs were met and I was able to look past myself and help this beautiful world around me to thrive. I wanted to protect nature. I wanted to bring up other humans to a place where they could see and appreciate what I was able to at the moment. 

Pay it forward. Forward this message. Activate and do something, anything… and give me some ideas back along the way… 

Only we can help each other. Our families, our neighbors, our communities. It starts with me. It starts with you.   

If just one person does one thing to help raise us all as humans from reading this blog; then I consider that a success. 

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On Rainbows

Posted on by Esterina Francesca

This morning I was doing mantras on my beloved mala beads off the Exuma Islands in the Bahamas on our good friend’s catamaran. 

It suddenly started to drizzle, then rain – quite abruptly and hard. My husband who was doing his own yoga on the other hull and I ran to the back of the boat where we were greeted with a beautiful rainbow.

Wow… It stopped me in my tracks. How beautiful. And how beautiful to see a full rainbow on the horizon. We are so lucky.

I couldn’t help but think of the state of Ukraine and her beautiful human citizens who are not so lucky. These past few days I have instinctively wanted to use personal mantra to will something positive or hopeful to the outcome of this unnecessary war. But I also remembered that mantra is personal and will not work for anyone outside yourself. I briefly wondered just then as I have for the past several mornings why then do we use group mantra to raise consciousness or send faith outward? 

The answer was in front of me. 

The rainbow. I marveled at the colors. The anagram of ROY G BIV that I learned around the kindergarten years. The order holds true no matter where you are. 

About 10 years ago while listening to U2’s song Ultraviolet, I contemplated and then researched the meaning of colors and the length of their spectrums. As I started to get back into art a few years later, I considered the meaning of colors even more. The way they blend, and how a color wheel can seem continuous from red to purple, it’s really not. Purple to red is the only place on the wheel that isn’t quite part of nature. What happens between those two? Is there a real place between them? 

White light contains it all. The earth bends the suns rays and we get the rainbow to the visible eye. But what is beyond that? We know about infrared and ultraviolet, but what is there that we can’t see or detect with the combination of instruments and our 5 senses? 

Universally red is considered basic and instinctive while purple is considered spiritual and highly conscious. Red is larger and takes up more space on the rainbow. Purple is smaller and is only accessed by passing all of the rainbow’s outer colors. 

What lies past purple going inward?

What can’t we see?

I stared at this gem that appears when the elements of fire (sun) and water mix into the element of air seemingly right into the element of earth’s horizon. 

The purple color starts to go within. 

Going within is the key. It’s the path to something deeper, meaningful and what isn’t just a mirage or hologram, but what is real and we can’t see or detect with our eyes. 

We can all go within and quiet the mind of excuses, fears, worries, selfish desires, etc to find the right answer to anything. The answer that is ultimately right for the world, not just the human who is asking. 

Those fears, excuses, desire, etc are the other “colors” you need to pass through in order to find the peace within. 

The place within where field or maybe plane of existence of the personal self does not matter. What matters is what is real and what is for the greater good. 

So perhaps the question I wondered about mantras for personal matters vs mantras for others was right there in the rainbow. It is the bridge between personal self and greater good. I can do mantra to seek my own higher consciousness, which is ultimately for the greater good. Or I can chant with others in community for the greater good. 

It all works if the intention is to leave all the material and selfish behind and pray for peace and harmony for all. 

ALL. 

Regardless of species, race, skin or hair color, or beliefs anyone was taught. 

If you truly truly go within, you too will know that none of anything material or visible matters if what you wish for others is what you want for yourself. 

Just some of my deeper thoughts this morning. 

Namaste

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Chinese New Year and the Magic of Your Thoughts

Posted on by Esterina Francesca

Last year right around this time a trip to the post office may have changed my life.

I was online and noticed a sign for stamps celebrating Chinese New Year. I picked up my phone to look up the date. Friday, February 12, 2021. I wondered why Chinese New Year wasn’t based on the calendar. 

Later, at home, I popped that very question into Google. I learned Chinese New Year was based on the new moon and I read quite a bit about the traditions and celebration.

Still, I wondered – Why this time of year? 

A few days later during my morning meditation routine I had some interesting thoughts. 

This time last year I set an intention during my morning meditation to quit drinking. I would do some EFT (tapping) and imagine burning up the energies getting in the way of doing so.

For the New Year of 2021 I placed a Shiva statue on my meditation table and switched my daily mala mantra to “Om Namah Shivaya”. I also placed a wooden sign I painted above the door frame of my meditation space with this same mantra.

Each morning felt fresh and new. I optimistically thought “Today is the day I don’t drink”. By mid-day I’d decide to drink, but that would be the last day. It was a futile merry go round and I couldn’t seem to make it stop and find where the exit back into the amusement park was.

I needed a push. I chose Shiva for that push. Stick with me about why… 

In yoga teacher training I learned a little about Hinduism and the 3 main deities of Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva. They are the Creator, Sustainer, and Destroyer. In Ayruveda they can be likened to Spring, Summer and Fall/Winter. 

Shiva destroys the season of summer each year and ushers in Fall, then Winter. At some point Brahma takes over and creation starts over. Spring begins. Simple enough concept. 

This particular morning of 2/8 on my meditation cushion, I looked up at this piece I created in 2019.  It may literally look like “Chinese” to anyone but me – however; it represents my own conglomeration of beliefs/knowledge regarding Taoism, Hinduism, Ayurveda, the seasons, the directions of the earth, time, and the color wheel. 

I thought about Shiva and my question of why Chinese New Years falls during this time of year.

And while looking at my art I saw how I incorporated the 3 primary colors with the 3 Ayurvedic doshas into 4 seasons. 

Was there is a distinct point in which Spring really begins and Winter ends? A time when Shiva’s work ends and Brahma’s begins? How could it not be at this very time of year? 

While the ground is frozen and the leaves are long gone, it’s only 3 or so weeks away from crocuses coming up. Clearly flowers can’t pop up above ground without some underground work below right?

Buds are already on the trees at the Equinox. 

Mother Nature silently begins her work as the days become noticeably longer but it’s still very much winter. 

She must start around now. And why not with a mid-winter New Moon? Seems like good timing to me! Perhaps that is when the bulk of Shiva’s work is “done” for the season. 

Still with my conglomerate story? 

Shiva is a “destroyer” but simultaneously/alternatively known as a change agent or transformer. When Shiva is involved, it is apparent.

In this famous statue, Shiva is shown dancing. He is known as the cosmic dancer. Stomping and keeping the beat of the universe moving. The stomping and dancing represent moving things along, transforming life and matter, keeping it all going and preventing it all from being stuck. 

It’s why I was meditating and attempting to tap into this energy.

Side Note: In Christianity – Do you know who else is known as the Lord of the Dance?

This particular Monday morning of 2/8 I lamented on how another weekend went by and I did not stop drinking. Chinese New Year was that Friday 2/12. A new start, a new beginning. I would stop by that Friday with the Chinese New Year NO MATTER WHAT.  

I went through my morning routine: meditate, tap, mantra; with the strong intention of quitting the drink woven in.  

Be careful what you wish for. And even more importantly how you wish for it. 

That Friday did not arrive, at least not in the way I had planned. I wanted to stop by then and by golly some forces came in like a lion and made darn good certain that by Friday I was not to be drinking.

I drank that Monday. Forces were with me. There were four very irritating things taking place around me; four really tough things that would irritate and worry just about anyone.

Did I face them? No I didn’t. I drank instead. 

So what happened?

I lost my mind. I had a strong and violent PTSD episode. It wasn’t the first time. I had a lovely trip to the Emergency Room until the wee hours of the night because I was simply unable to stop hyperventilating in an elevated panic attack. 

It was on a gurney in the middle of the night on the morning of 2/9/21 at Yale New Haven Hospital, by myself. In the middle of a pandemic with a mask on and the future unknown in every way. 

I KNEW what had happened wouldn’t have happened if I did not drink. I couldn’t drink anymore. There can’t be any more “tomorrows” when I’ll quit. It had to happen now. Not Friday. NOW. I looked up a service I kept seeing on TV during my soap opera where they come into your home to help you with addiction issues. I put in a request for information and I began enrollment the next day.

The next few days and weeks were an absolute mess. I made a mess of my life. I didn’t live in my house again until April. My husband and I didn’t live together again until June. 

It was the worst of times.

It was the best of times. 

I prayed for a Shiva-like intervention. A Shiva like intervention is what I got.

It’s not how I would have imagined I’d get there, but it happened.

I don’t know if anything else would have given me pause to really self-reflect and evaluate where I was in my life, how I’d gotten there, and to really acknowledge and own the mistakes I made along with way.  

I knew the moment I made the absolute decision to quit that no matter what came next, things would be better even if everything fell apart and my future life would be unrecognizable. 

“All of these things make me who I am”

On the one hand my whole life, every decision I made and experiences I lived through led me to where I was (the bottle). On the other hand, in trying to quit and going to therapy and learning about PTSD with the intention to become a better person for the prior 10+ years; I felt I had been training for this moment for a long time. 

I’d learned and understood deeply before then that life goes on and everything happens for a reason. I learned how to meditate and breath through it. I knew where to look for resources, who in my life would be helpful, how to fall asleep in the face of pain and how to channel the influx of both good and bad overwhelming energy into something creative. 

I knew from mistakes past that I had to stop and rest when my body called for it. I knew I had to forgive myself when I really took the veil off about how I had hurt others. While it hurt to know, see and feel this pain, I knew ultimately it was ok because I had faith and know my creator doesn’t make mistakes. I was not supposed to be in any other place in space or time other than where I was.

It wasn’t AS easy as I am writing it out to sound. But it was easier than I thought. I knew no matter what happened that I would be ok, and eventually even better. I had preferences on what I would have liked and put the intentions out there. But I was careful to also put out the intention to accept whatever did happen, especially if it is ultimately for my own good.

Good things happened to a handful of others in my immediate circle as well. Based on some of the realizations and choices I made, others were able to ultimately respond to me in healthier ways and evaluate themselves with a new set of eyes.

If I expanded what I just wrote to those I have met in the past year from various recovery avenues; I have been unbelievably inspired and have been told that I have inspired many others too.

While not quite a picnic, everything that transpired put me and my loved ones in a more enlightened and accepting place. 

There are some folks in my outer circle who might not see it that way, but I trust in the powers that be that if those individuals were willing to look, there is a gem in there for them to uncover as well. Something we were meant to bump into one another for to better ourselves and each other in some form.

The Coelho’s The Alchemist, the boy searches the world for the treasure, only to learn it’s been within the whole time. One of my favorite lines from that book is: 

“And, when you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it.” 
― Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist

Thank you Shiva? 

However, the universe will not give you what you want directly. It will provide for you the intention that you have behind that desire. 

If your intentions are less than desirable, selfish, or towards only your kind/posse/etc, that will come to you just as it was put out. The Lord’s Prayer tells us this in the line: 

“And forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us”. 

You will only get from the universe what you give. 

“When we strive to become better than we are, everything around us becomes better, too.” 
― Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist

If you strive to become better – and your intentions are pure, you will see how clearly this plays out and notice how you are creating your own life with your own thoughts. 

It’s TRICKY. Pure doesn’t mean “I want to be rich”. Being rich means someone else loses or you have more than others. That isn’t pure and even if it happens, it will not manifest in ways that feel good. 

While tricky, little can go wrong if you are good and have respectable intentions. Also, it is important to be and be clear about what you want, because as you vacillate the universe is equally vacillating in giving it to you. 

I learned a lot this past year. Especially how I can enjoy life more by controlling my thinking which is so much easier when it is never clouded by alcohol. 

My life is different, but you’d hardly notice. Good and bad things can and will always happen. But it has been easier as I learn and remember to accept what is and I’m not pining and wishing for it to be any different. 

While I still may instinctively want things another way – I need to know that I really don’t want it any other way. What happens as my response to it – that is ALL on me. 

Namaste. 

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Who in the World is “Modern” Technology for?

Posted on by Esterina Francesca

I’m on a tear about technology today. It started this morning at work when I was asked to make two calendars from one my work group has on our SharePoint. Simple enough right? Make a new calendar, put what is needed on the new one and delete that same content off the old. 

But no. It’s not that simple. 

Without going into all kinds of boring details there’s no longer a button to click to create a new calendar (which by the way was hidden & knowing how to find that one was a feat in & of itself). 

Now there are new apps that don’t even have names that a normal human would know what they are. After a time too long to admit, I found a ‘calendar looking’ app. I went to click on it, and was asked to request access. At that point I was provided a link where I could check the status of my request. 

About 10 minutes later I get an email from an IT link about my calendar looking app request. The app was not yet approved; but I received another link to a page with help to find apps. There I learn that there is a link to the “Classics”. The classics are documents, calendars, announcements, group chats… The classics? You mean what real living and breathing employees use? Am I that old? 

I just can’t with this stuff. 

I thought I finally learned how to work my “Smart” TV. I know what the remotes do and how to add & delete apps, subscribe to channels, etc. Things my older family members and siblings have yet to figure out. Maybe my kids have, but I’m not so sure. However, when I went to watch a few purchased Holiday videos a few weeks back I learned that Fandango where I bought them was sold to some other company. I spent about an hour trying to get to my old account and figure out passwords and where to find “purchased content”. I never found it. We just ended up watching what was free. 

What was so wrong with purchasing content that you can hold in your hand and keep in your cabinet? I still don’t know what happened to the movies I paid for. 

My car is a 2017 Prius. It has a touch screen and built-in navigation that never seems to work. Or when I do get the nav to work, I can’t seem to ever turn off the route. Every button, every option, every possible thing… and there is no “End Route” or equivalent. Sometimes the built in Siri works, sometimes not. I don’t even know 80% of what my car is capable of. And this car came out 6 years ago! I don’t even want to think about what a 2022 model can do that I’d never know after having it for 5 years. 

Every time I go into my husband’s car (Telsa) I can’t even find the place to press the “Esterina” button because new updates moved it. 

I look around and I don’t see many people smarter than me using all these features and things with ease. 

When I do figure things out, they don’t seem to work. 

I programmed Alexa to go through a morning routine, but the news app I chose always cut out mid report. At first Alexa finished the routine, but then she stopped. I checked the programming and it was all still the same. I changed the news source and the same thing happened – worked for a few days then the news source stopped mid briefing the routine ended.  

I can’t tell you how many times I went to play a song or album I KNOW I bought but it’s disappeared from my iTunes.

Family Share works terribly. The apps my husband or I purchase and try to share never come over to the other phone. I cannot for the life of me figure out how to get his music. What is the family share even for? It says it does these things, but they either don’t work or we can’t figure them out after spending inornate amounts of time trying. 

We had a smart oven for a short bit of time. The buttons were so sensitive that if your sleeve brushed against it while grabbing a pot the whole thing would turn off. One of our cats constantly walked across the stove and turned it on. Luckily there was a lock feature, but the “Smart” part of the oven doesn’t work when the lock is on. I can’t tell you why we bought a smart stove. You need to link Alexa through 3rd party apps to it, and it worked at best half the time.

Same with our “smart” lights. We use GoSund. They continually unlink from the programming. When you just want to turn on the light and say “#?!*&” to the programming, they blink uncontrollably. They are unusable as just an ordinary light at that point. So –  it’s either the dark or pull out the phone and spend 5-10 minutes figuring out what went wrong. 

We have a Wi-Fi enable dryer. I have no idea how to use it with the Wi-Fi or what I’d use it for.

1,001 very cool things have been made by me or others at work in the past 10-12 years. Things that make people’s lives easier. BUT almost all have become undone due to updates, websites that moved, or macros that broke. I spend way too much of my time trying to figure out what someone who left the organization did in the background to fix something someone relied upon that stopped working. 

Even here – on Word Press where I am writing this blog I’m befuddled. It seems like each time I get on things moved or have a new name. I have been using this platform since 2015 and all I know how to do is post a blog. I know Word Press can do so many super things, but when I start to read about them or try to figure them out I run into so many walls I just give up and need to put the computer in another room.

This just isn’t cool. This is all a colossal waste of time. The world is getting too complicated and regular people can’t (and don’t want to) keep with the changes forced upon us. Can we just cool it already? 

Competition creates more and more and faster and faster – for what? Just because we can, doesn’t mean we should. Similar to the industrial revolution and the assembly line. Simply because we can make a million widgets an hour, doesn’t mean we should. But we did, and then we created a whole new discipline called marketing to encourage people to buy what they didn’t need. Then they needed to work harder and longer to pay for the unnecessary widgets. This is the part of history that most of us were born into and accept blindly without question.

Life didn’t get better because we have homes triple the size with quadruple the number of possessions. We should learn from the past and take a break from making things that make no sense. Technology advances for consumers does not work well yet. The population hasn’t caught up to what is out there, and the programmers have not figured out the bugs. I wish the techies of this world would stop creating and just focus on making what we already have better for a while. 

I know humans thrive on creation and Henry Ford famously said “If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.”. However there are one too many creators, none of them collaborate, and we have one big hot mess going on. Let’s be creative with making the status quo actually work. Henry Ford made the car, not a spaceship. It seems like we need the equivalent to cars in our lives, not spaceships things we have no use for.

Honestly – If I am an upper-middle class citizen with a Masters degree in a first world country that happens to be in a pocket of humans that can figure out technology faster than my 20 something year old adult children and faster than my parent’s generation – I beg to ask the question, who or what on are we advancing consumer technology for?

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On the Secret Life Around Us

Posted on by Esterina Francesca

Last weekend my husband and I had a smaller, pandemic approved sized gathering for our annual Swedish Smorgasbord. A good friend of mine brought a Christmas cactus as a hosting gift. I left it on my counter that evening, transplanted it to a permanent pot the next day and assigned it a temporary space until the holiday decorations come down and it will be placed in it’s new home.

I went about my life for the next few days and this morning there were two new blooms. 

Yawn huh? 

But no. That little beauty which looks inanimate is working full time at this moment to bloom for this time of year. This plant’s whole existence is to make these flowers around right now. 

I love this Albert Einstein quote.

I love being mindful. When I am, it is simply amazing to realize there is a secret life all around us that we often don’t acknowledge.

The plants. The trees. Animals. Our own pets. 

They are living beings just like we are and are carrying out their life’s purpose.

Do you have a tree up for the holidays? Is it live? It is carrying out it’s purpose. 

I just wanted to take the smallest of moments to appreciate life. All life. Even when we are not paying attention (almost always!), life is carrying on and doing it’s thing. Life doesn’t care who we are. We have almost no control of anything outside of us. These things at least seem to know it better than us. These things are all around us reminding us that we have no control and that life really is a miracle should we chose to see it that way. 

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On Surrender

Posted on by Esterina Francesca

Hearing the word invokes an image in my mind of a person on the ground with a hand up, holding a white flag with one hand using whatever energy they have left to wave it. It also reminds me of many times as a kid playing board games with my brother Mario where one of us was winning so far ahead of the other that the loser decided to surrender, to not waste any more time playing a “losing hand”.

 

The word always felt like defeat to me, but now I see it differently. I view the word as honesty, truth, and innate beauty. 

 

As I described it above, surrender can also mean not wasting any more time. Surrender can mean being honest about what isn’t working and accepting what really is. Why waste time doing what isn’t working? Why not be honest about the situation and go from there? 

 

I subscribe to Richard Rohr’s daily meditation. Each week is themed. This week’s focus is on Spirituality and Addiction. Today’s meditation is about surrender. In it he writes “Surrender is the strongest, most subversive thing you can do in this world. It takes strength to admit you are weak, bravery to show you are vulnerable…”. 

 

There were two days earlier this March where I “surrendered” and literally felt a physical shift due to a change in my mental thoughts. A shift so powerful that it tangibly exhausted me. 

 

The first was a day while I was living alone in East Haven and coming to grips with a pending divorce and newly achieved sobriety. I picked up a Dialectical Behavior Ttherapy (DBT) workbook that I hadn’t touched but owned for a few years. I decided to do some exercises in this book each day. I was a few days in when I came upon the term “radical acceptance”. I was performing the radical acceptance exercises and was challenged to fully accept my current situation. I looked around and cried. I didn’t want to. I could NOT accept where I was at that moment in time. But I wanted very badly to experience radical acceptance, as there were so many benefits to doing so.

 

I closed the book and contemplated this. It felt like an angel and devil on my opposite shoulders as my mind shifted back and forth about whether or not to accept my situation. At some point about ten minutes into a mix of contemplation and crying, the angel suddenly made perfect sense when she said “But it’s where you are!”. 

 

It occurred to me that whether or not I accepted it, it IS where I am. Why am I not just accepting that this IS my reality at this moment in time? Whether or not I accept it, it doesn’t change a single thing. 

 

I’m going to write that again – Whether I “accept” it or not; it doesn’t change a single thing. 

 

I’m still where I am. So why not surrender to accepting my actual reality? When I realized this; if there was a visual of two parts of me that were in conflict; one literally faded into oblivion while the other filled in what just left. In the next minute or two I began to feel whole; lighter, and open. A physical shift materially took place once I changed my mind and surrendered.

 

In A Return to Love, Marianne Williamson says, “Until your knees finally hit the floor, you’re just playing at life, and on some level you’re scared because you know you’re just playing. The moment of surrender is not when life is over. It’s when it begins.” 

 

The next moment for me was about a week later. It was a dark early evening on a Sunday night when I just had to get out of the apartment where I was staying. I left – with nothing but my wallet and phone and drove off. It was cold and I didn’t know where to go. I suddenly had the desire to just write. I drove over to Walgreens and purchased a notebook. I grabbed a pen from my glovebox and a blanket from my trunk and sat on the town green with the light of my phone. I put the phone on airplane mode and just started to write. And write. And write.

 

I wrote about “poor me”. I wrote about how my kids and husband would tell me these things about myself that “weren’t true”. I stopped. I thought about what I had just written and I thought about radical acceptance. Again, I had an angel and devil on my shoulders in conflict. What they said was not true, I thought, but should I accept it? I remembered surrendering the week before to my reality and thought about surrendering to this. I cried. I didn’t want to, but this time it was easier to imagine just accepting this, to explore it completely, and perhaps write about it. 

 

So I put pen to paper and shifted my thoughts to how this was their reality and wrote. And wrote, and wrote, and wrote… Until it occurred to me that there was truth in what they were saying. Whether or not I liked it didn’t matter. This is what they experienced and it was true despite why or how it came to be. The explanations didn’t matter- it all happened. I radically accepted this. 

 

It happened, and whether or not they want to accept what my reality was or why, I needed to accept my part in it wholly. And I did. In a very distinct moment I didn’t care anymore when, why or how; I understood them and understood it all completely.

 

At the time my son was off from his job on paid leave because of a COVID outbreak at the place he works and was staying with my husband. I decided to write him a letter explaining that I understood him and understood everything he has told me 100% inside and out. I wrote my heart out. I wanted to write a letter to my husband too but my energy had waned, so I decided to just rip out the pages that I wrote and share with him my thoughts and how they had shifted to an understanding of him. I added a few lines to explain why I was sharing and made the decision to drive the letters over and leave them in the mailbox.

 

By this time it was fairly late in the evening. I felt so amazing. Lighter. Freer. I went into Stop & Shop to buy them some cookies I was obsessed with at the time and I drove over to my old neighborhood. I saw the trash and recycling bins out front since it was Sunday night, and for the briefest moment I felt jealous that I didn’t live there and wasn’t part of putting out the trash. But more so I immediately felt radical acceptance that I didn’t live there and I imagined a world where I’d be in a new place with maybe a different trash pick-up day; and alone and even dare I say… happy? 

 

I was able to surrender. I was able to accept my circumstances. And you know what? I was really ok with it! 

 

I put the letters in the mailbox and sent my son and husband a text. I drove home in an almost bliss-like state. I felt light, tired, and hungry. Really hungry! I saw a McDonalds sign and craved a Big Mac! I hadn’t eaten meat in a very long time, but my body was just spent and I just wanted something highly caloric and comforting.

 

Surrendering never tasted or felt so good.

 The first of the 12 Steps of Recovery is to admit we are powerless. I first learned of the 12 steps on a spiritual Podcast around 2014. The speaker convinced me that every single one of us is addicted to something (drugs, drink, tv, shopping, money, obsessive thought patterns, etc) and that the first step is to admit powerlessness. Is that really different from surrender or radical acceptance?  

The moment I let go and opted to understand, somehow it gave others around me permission to do the same. The universe knew what needed to be done. When we admit where we are and our part in it, miracles happen. The happiness behind it just pours out because there is nothing, not a single story, holding it back. It’s acceptance of the present moment. Radical acceptance. It’s surrender.  Surrender changed everything and every important relationship in my life. 

 

Fast forward several months down the line. Daren and I have never been more understanding of one another. We renewed our vows a few weeks ago. We wrote our own to one another. I referenced the song “Moment of Surrender” by U2 and read out loud the portion 

 

The stone was semi-precious
We were barely conscious
Two souls too smart to be
In the realm of certainty
Even on our wedding day

 

10 years before on our wedding day we were like two robots going about in the world doing things that adults do because it’s what adults do. As the years passed I started to spiritually wake up and perhaps took him with me. We are now so aware and conscious of what our biases were; how they played a role in our history and what we do in the present moment. 

 

“We see the world, not as it is, but as we are” Stephen Covey

Don’t we all perceive things based on our own knowledge and circumstances? Couldn’t it perhaps do us good to know what our biases are so when we assess a situation we know our perspective and can imaginatively consider ways others see this same thing? The only way to do this is to surrender to the knowledge that we have biases in the first place. We are attached or addicted to the way we think or want something to be. Accepting it is freeing. Don’t we all want to be free and feel ok with life as it is? 

Later in U2’s song the lyrics state: 

I’ve been in every black hole
At the altar of the dark star
My body’s now a begging bowl
That’s begging to get back, begging to get back
To my heart
And to the rhythm of my soul
And to the rhythm of my unconsciousness
To the rhythm that yearns
To be released from control

 

Our bodies want that freedom. Once you experience surrender it’s hard to come to grips with that fight in you anymore because you know what is on the other side and it’s so much better to just let go and accept life as it is. If you fight this and you are aware of yourself, as Bono sings, you can actually feel your body begging to get back to that open good place where love and the soul accept life on life’s terms. The Marianne Williamson quote above is from A Return to Love. Because surrendering brings you to love.

I will not pretend that I don’t forget this a lot. But I can tell you that once you do, you know freedom and once you do, it’s far easier to do it again and again. I’m not saying this is easy, but I can promise you it is worth it.  

 

I’m going to end this blog with the refrain (below) which reminds me of the Safire Rose Poem “She Let Go”. Only you know when you surrender. The world goes on. The moon shines, and you – you are FREE.

 

At the moment of surrender
I folded to my knees
I did not notice the passers-by
And they did not notice me

 

 

Namaste

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On Being Middle Aged

Posted on by Esterina Francesca

When I was a teenager, then a twenty something; I thought middle age or (gasp) older was absolutely an dreadful place to be. Like many younger adults I didn’t know what I didn’t know. I knew better. I was always right. I did things the best way. Older people were out of touch.

I don’t want to be younger, nor do I look back at my own life or the younger beings around me with envy. I like where I am. I will even go the mat and say I think middle aged is the best part of life. After the crisis part of course. If you are “lucky” enough to have a mid life crisis at all.

I’m 45. To some that sounds like “only 45?” and to others that might sound like “45??? Gulp”.

The crisis was the worst/best part of coming to terms with life on life’s terms and with who I am. Not everyone will have one, and many who do have one will not change. With that aside, I believe that even without one; mid life is an awesome part of life.

The best thing is a combination of experience and health. If you reasonably take care of yourself, you can be fairly healthy during mid life. With almost 30 years of driving and workplace experience, these years are a sweet spot of cruising with confidence through otherwise tricky or unknown areas. No major physical decline yet combined with good reflexes, memory, and ability to pick up and respond to life’s surroundings.

By middle age most people (not all of course) are financially comfortable. Less worries about paying bills, less interest in having more, staying fashionable or climbing the ladder. It allows me to live and work with comfort. I’m old enough to be taken seriously, experienced enough to understand life/work dynamics, and still young enough to switch in a dime to learn new programs, policies, software, phone apps…

Aside from my far sightedness slightly declining each year at my annual Optometry visit, I’m in the best physical health of my life. I’ve learned to make sleep important, exercise a routine part of life, and to make wise food decisions for the sake of my health.

Mental hygiene takes a front place as well. I’m no longer embarrassed about having human responses to stress and pressure, so I don’t pretend they don’t exist and take an active stance in dealing with those types of things. I no longer view self care or down time as a reward or something for others, but a necessity to keep myself fresh, in good health and useful to society.

Speaking of embarrassment, caring about what other people think just isn’t a thing anymore. I’m not afraid to be myself or of failing. I know it’s a part of life and if anyone else judges that, it’s none of my business. As long as my intentions are pure I have nothing to hide or be ashamed of. I enjoy realizing when I messed up or was wrong and it feels good to acknowledge that to myself and others.

I have enough years of cooking experience to cobble things together from my pantry that taste phenomenal. I try all kinds of art projects I would have felt like a poser to attempt. I love the way I dress, decorate, garden, clean, cook, love others, and live my life. I have go-to recipes, outfits, and ways to entertain that work. I am comfortable with the skills I have and know my limitations on the skills I do not. I am so ok with what I lack. No one can have all they want.

In taking risks, I am excited to try new things. What is the worst thing if I don’t like it? I just won’t do it again.

I believe I can now live life with a good balance of safety and risk. Being young is often accompanied by an irrational idea of invincibility. I see many older people living with too much fear of too many things. I might get to that point too, but at this point I know I do not like the way fear feels. It makes me feel small and trapped rather than safe. Instead of succumbing to it, I live safely in my actions but am courageous enough to push through what a rational mind knows will be ok. That wasn’t the experience in my younger days!

There is so much more to say, but I’ll stop here. Honestly the mid life crisis and coming into what Richard Rohr calls “the second half” is what got me to a really beautiful place where acceptance of what is, is how I want to live life. It was about 8-10 years of chaos, and something for another blog.

I do not know better. I am absolutely not always right. There are so many ways to do things and different ways work for different folks. Older people have wisdom and our elders are our teachers.

So, I will ride the tides and adjust the sails instead of fighting the waves and expecting days of perfection. And I will enjoy this moment that will too pass where I am grateful to be healthy and middle aged.

Namaste.

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