Happy Place

Its been a while sense I wrote on this blog. I am laid off work and in what I call a major life "in the mean time" I have not clue what that means yet have been saying it for years.

One word I do not say is but...as in "I like you but....." Yet..:) I use Yet now and my Mentor says its a light form of but...I think I may rid myself of "yet" soon as well.

Back to the "mean time" I am laid off work and running out of money fast and single and I am happy. I wake up smiling and wake up happy and just trust that I am just where I am to be right at this time and am enjoying the moment. How many women my age get to rent a room somewhere and find them selves? No one I know.

I spend all my time job hunting and yesterday I stepped outside the box. I woke up happy and then started thinking "What if's" for about five minutes! "What if i do not get a job and can not pay rent" etc. I stopped what I was doing and headed off to the mall / womens center. Hey.....Its NOT my fault that the womens center where they have job leads and interview clothing for displaced women is at the MALL :) After I visited the womens center I tried on pants and to my delight I am now a size 8! I kid you not! I tried on 3 different pairs of pants to make sure I was a true 8 and I am. Now, what does that have to do with anything? Alot. I stepped outside the job hunt box a bit to bring joy to my life by trying on pants! Then I went out in the mall and listened to the beautiful Christmas music playing and made a mental note of the stores so I can go online and apply today, See I was job hunting while I was finding my joy yesterday. Finding joy each day is a must as I do not use bad behaviors like eating to find joy.

I then went and stood in a small line and visited Santa. I did! I sat on his lap and got my picture taken with a few friends two years ago and I actually lived in his house. He and his beautiful wife own a home and rent out rooms to women that need help and are displaced. I lived there a few months and am grateful to him and he is Santa each year in the mall. He loves life and loves to give and he is a true real Santa. So i went to see him to tell him and how him how great I am doing and he just smiled a huge smile. He loves when his girls do well.....He is cute and calls his wife his "Blonde Bomb Shell" ...priceless.

OK after I went to see Santa i left the mall and went down town to a art gallery. My friend Allanah and I became friends with her after we trespassed in her back yard. I had a chat with her and she told me about a natural foods store that is hiring and said she will be on he look out for me. My mentor told me to network and he is so correct! setting on a computer just sending out resumes will not totally cut it in this economy and for the jobs I am applying for and my hearts desire is to work at a natural foods store and that will take networking of some kind.

Where am I going with all this? I had the choice to set in my dark room and apply online for jobs all day long or get my butt up and go out and do something different and to find JOY in all you do. That mall / art gallery trip changed my whole day and outlook on life!

We all have different things that transform our moods or attitudes. Mine is being around positive people.......What works for one person does not work for another. I have friends who get happy and transformed watching tv and that does not work for me. Find your own happy place and force yourself to get off your butt and go there and stay there until you are singing zippidy doo dah!

Green Eyed Christmas Monster Cheryl

OK I'm going to get real here, not that I do not get real when I write its just that I choose to write only when im positive and inspired which is most days! I also can not help all women if I am not honest about my day where I am just in a wonky mood.

The last few days I have been in a place of great fantasy. I am in "Green Eyed Monster Mode" :) I made that up! And it fits me pretty well at the moment.

I am in the mood to make a face / stick out my tongue or just just roll my eyes at all the women in my life or even those I dont know who are home / key word is "home" decoration their homes / shopping for Christmas/ watching their husbands smile as he is hanging up the Christmas lights out in the snow! Their grown daughters are calling them off the hook "Mom, Lets go to the mall today to finish up shopping and then we can go see a Christmas play" ......."No, girls lets back cookies and your dad will want to help and I will call your brother to bring eggnog" :) Silly....

Get my point? .............and so silly and I can swear to you that I did not make up the above fantasies in my head. How silly. I guess this season with me being back to me is the hardest one of all. Yes, when i was in poor Cheryl was abandoned mode and poor Cheryl is just not sure where her life was going mode. All was just ok. I was just in limbo and just surviving and to not have anything was ok. Now, I am back to Cheryl who had a home and family and a couch and chairs and even a oven mode and its not acceptable for me to be where I am at! Yet, I have to remember that like a person that has survived a bad illness or accident you have to get up and start moving and before you know it you will be back to full speed. it just takes time.......

Some of my fantasies can be real but most likely Dad is yelling from the roof "*&^%$#*" "I JUST SMASHED MY THUMB, I TOLD YOU XMAS LIGHTS ARE A BAD IDEA" "Mom.....I hate shopping are u nuts the mall is packed" "Mom, i hate eggnog and im off to a Christmas party call you tomorrow" :) Serious....Both are exaggerations but real life is neither....or a bit of both. We as women have got to stop fantasizing about what we want our life to look like when God has us right where we are meant to be at this very moment. When I talk to some of my married friends they say to me "Enjoy this time for just you" and I have got to not get in Green Eyed Monster mode.

Carolyn said yesterday that my future is like a cake :) Carolyn and Michael use analogies on me as I respond to them and love them. They crack me up with what they think of.....Im like a House and a car and now my whole life is a cake! She said that its in the oven baking and if i take it out now it will not be done and will be raw and awful and will fall in the middle! And worse and what I have been trying to do is to TURN UP THE HEAT to make that cake cook FASTER! and what will happen. It will burn. Now every time I turn it up to 500 degrees Carolyn and Michael turn it back down to 350. Thank Goodness for them in my life. The other thing is that I do not want a fake desperate cake from the store. It would be a easy cake to go get. Its artificial and fake and not the real deal and not what I have been waiting for! So........What am I do Do?????

I am to Wait on God! wow....what a concept. I have never waited for "cake" before. :) I am excited to see what my life is going to be like?

For now I just keep being Cheryl and as Michael says "HAVE FUN"....and he always types it in caps. He does not say much on instant message." Have fun, be strong and brave...keep going...your doing excellent" Carolyn says "You are right where you are meant to be and your future will be great" I LOVE YOU TWO!

And Fun is what I am planning to do for the whole of 2011......

And If God Willing....

Eat Cake....yum!

Sophie Behrs

Its been awhile sense I have been to my journal. I write in a paper notebook from time to time yet I love this blog. My desire is for women in their first years of being along for the first time to stumble onto this and get blessed by it.

Today I was reading about a lady "Sophie Behrs" In 1862 she married what they termed the catch of the season "Count Leo Tolstoy" and they had 13 children! She was a wife and mom and they both had a passion for writing. She decided that their marriage was going to be a creative partnership of equals! She was way past her time in knowing what would work. She was her husbands assistant, editor, copywriter and tactful critic. Wow.....Again im reminded this was 1862.

Once the children arrived she could not keep up with it all and back in the 1800's she could not get "day care" and it was expected of her to take care of the children. Her husband right at this time had what he thought was a "good idea" He thought they could write in journals and keep them around for each other to read! Bad Idea and I know this because I read some of her journal this morning and it was a pathetic warship of her husband. NOT love.....not respect.

In my readings today were some of her journal entries. They were pathetic and sad and the only place she thought she could go. In victim mode. The journal praised her husband over and over and it was nauseating to read even for me who has been in such a situation with a past marriage! She wrote on page after page of how miserable she was and how lucky her husband was to have a writing profession and on and on. He took on another assistant at this time and it about destroyed her self esteem.

Ok.......that was 1800!!! But girlies how many of us are just like Sophie in 2010? Alot....and there is no excuse as we have books and ministers and great women leaders who are our sisters there to help. We have Oprah :) Yes, if you are married its a must to be a supportive devoted wife yet there is NO excuse to loose yourself completely in a man even if you call him husband! You will loose all respect for yourself and so will he. This is not being a submissive wife or any other kind of good wife. Its being freaky! How do you balance it? I was Sophie to a T! and it was 2005!

How do you do it? For one you loose yourself slowly. Every time you compromise! "its ok honey I will quit my dance class as you want to watch american idle with me each day" "Its ok, you took me out to eat and i will eat it all so you wont get mad" "Its ok...I wont read my books anymore as you hate me to read" "its ok I wont go to lunch with my best friend as its not fair that you dont have a friend to do things with" "Honey, ok i understand that all men watch porn, i will try to understand" .....:) Get my point? Yes, some of the above can be worked out and some of them can not. Its like the frog in a pot of cold water that slowly starts to boil. Before he knows it he is boiled and gone! Without feeling a thing.

I do not pretend to know the answer of how to be a good wife or partner without completely loosing yourself as I am single now. I do know that I love being Cheryl and I wont loose her again and will only be with a man who loves her just as she is. I know there is balance and you do change a bit with a relationship. You take on new ideas that you learn from your partner and he takes things from you. The key here must be balance! Im going to master this one! I promise you all!