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Dear Tiffany,

There are moments when you are with people you love and who love you – online or in person or over text or phone call. And there are moments when you are eating food that nourishes you, breathing cool fresh air into lungs not anxiety-constricted, drinking Joe’s coffee with maple syrup or a London Fog or a chai latte (half sweet) or a Phil & Sebastian mocha. There are moments of sharing a show with a friend or making plans for community activism or finally making progress on a post that’s been impossible to write.

These are good moments.

May you have more of them, more intentionally, more joyfully, and more shamelessly.

Love,
Me

#tenderyear #100loveletters #dailypractices

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I was struggling with today’s Tender Year prompt. I felt like, despite my #oneweekofeasyanswers intention, I *should* write some kind of really fantastic love letter for today. I mean, I’m in a new country! I’m around the world! I came here because I chose to act on a dream and take steps towards my goals! That’s deserving of a ‘real’ love letter. And this is the only Tuesday I’ll be here! My only chance!

But actually I just want to be asleep.

And maybe the actions leading up to today are love letter enough. Maybe? Maybe.

When we have dragged ourselves up from rock bottom, sometimes we struggle to let ourselves off the hooks that hoisted us.

Commitment. Follow-through. Dedication. Determination. – the hooks that pulled me up. The hooks that sometimes now restrict me.

Anyway, I wanted to be asleep an hour ago but I couldn’t give myself permission until I got this done and I couldn’t get this done because my brain is fried.

Chickadee, maybe stop spinning sooner tomorrow, hey?

#tenderyear #100loveletters #dailypractices

Image description: purple ink. Text reads – Dear Tiffany,
Very often, love is action. Sometimes love is permission to not act.
‘Rest’ is also a verb.
Go to sleep.
Love,
Me

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Dear Tiffany,

What love letter do you need this evening?

Something gentle and easy – quick (to make the gap between now and bedtime smaller), but real (to make the gap between compassionate intention and compassionate action smaller).

A shrink ray of a love letter, then.

Something that makes gaps smaller.

Something that bridges gaps.

You are a stress cadet – Joe said today that you’ve been promoted to stress admiral, and Liz said that sounds like an accomplishment but not the good kind.

So, given that, let’s bridge a gap.

Tiffany, Stress Admiral in charge of Project Australia, Elf Commander of the Entrepreneur Ship, Not-Quite-New Stepparent collaborating on Team Hawkstrid, there is a gap between what you are doing and what you are giving yourself credit for doing.

Let’s make that gap a little bit smaller and acknowledge that you are doing quite a lot, and you are doing it quite well, and tomorrow you will get as much done as you can and it will be enough, and Thursday you will get on a plane! Going to Australia! Wow!

It’s a lot, chickadee.

It’s good.

Good job.

Now, sir, might I suggest a final cup of tea to round out the evening and then bed. Leave the rest of the to-do list for another day. You’re allowed to stop working without beating yourself up for the choice. It’s called self-care. Ooo, zing! I say this with love, truly.

And a bit of sass.

But mostly love.

Probably mostly love.

Love,
Me

#100loveletters #tenderyear #dailypractices

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I had a full day of full moon companionship with Stasha Huntingford and Nathan Fawaz, my Tender Year collaborators. We shared stories and tea and art supplies and pastries and laughter and time.

I am grateful. It was amazing.

Saturdays, we generate affirmations.

So, today, I affirm that this yearlong project, and my work within it, is good.

I affirm that this space and these companions are safe, and welcoming, and validating.

That this practice, of engaging each day with one of seven distinct but connected pathways into tenderness and attendance, is challenging, welcoming, and healing, and that it is also uncomfortable, unsettling, and transformative.

That I am drawing on old skills and developing new skills. Deepening old knowledge and dipping into new knowledge. Growing inward and outward.

I affirm that I am, in fact, tending to myself in the year of sacred attendance. I am offering tenderness, and learning how to attend to those needs for at least a few minutes every day.

I am doing what I set out to do.

And I am doing it in good company.

(And growing company! There are 20 subscribers to the email list, and the conversations around this project are tendriling up in little moments of “I noticed…” and “I saw…” and “I was wondering…” One goal of this yearlong project was to continue to build the community that sprang up around the #100loveletters project, and that goal is being met.)

All of these things are true.

And it is good to look at an amazing truth and feel that little flicker of awe. Sometimes we pull magic out of thin air, and that is amazing.

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#tenderyear #saturdayaffirmations #dailypractices