Your Pen Pal

October 9, 2020 | IN CHRISTINA'S BLOG/POSTS | BY christina

It’s late Thursday night, writing this letter to you. 

If you live in the US you will get it first thing Friday morning. 

With your cup of coffee or tea. 

If you are in Australia or New Zealand, it will be late at night. 

And if you are in the UK or Europe mid afternoon, with a scone and a cup of tea. 

So many of you also read this letter in India, in the early evening. 

And let me not forget the South Africa readers too. 

We have come far, you and I. 

We have talked about our youth, nostalgia, tragedy, gardening, the quarantine, love, loss, boundaries, aging, invisible losses, old selves, the waiting room. 

Our inner worlds. The details of our days. 

The moments in between the noise. Memories. 

Our beloveds, here and the beyond. Crying. 

Traveling. Selling houses. Friendships. 

Oh my friend, we had quite a ride haven’t we? 

And if you are just joining, don’t worry I am going to keep sending these letters. 

Maybe forever. 

After all, you are my best friend. 

Sometimes I tell you things I don’t tell anyone else. 

I used to think I would stop writing this letter at some point. 

I don’t think that anymore. 

Did you know I always dreamed of having my own column, maybe the New York Times will call me.

Hey Christina, we heard about your Friday letters. 

Can you write one to our readers too? 

Haha. Right?

You see, dreams just speak to you out of the blue. 

They just jump in. 

I let them. I never shoosh them. However crazy they are. 

And you just never know, maybe one day you will be reading your favorite news platform, and something would sound familiar. 

You would recognize the writing I hope. 

The voice that told you so many times to live your life, your way. 

It told you to need nothing, and be free of everyone and everything. 

To not care about what other people think. 

To live with few attachments, and no expectations. 

To do what you love even if it brings you little money. 

And to talk about everything that feels heavy, and everything that matters. 

To live your life not owing the world anything, but being of service, to everyone. 

For love. (Click to tweet!)

And this is why this has always been a love letter. 

 

With many extraordinary pen pals,

Christina 

P.S. The Life Reentry Class is finally open for registration once again here.

Sometimes, things come and hit you from out of nowhere.

It is like a punch in the dark.

A spit even.

Yes it feels like you are being spat on sometimes, doesn’t it?

And you don’t know why.

You were not even in a battle.

Not in the ring.

Lights were out.

You were not expecting a visitor.

Nobody rang the bell.

And boom, you get hit.

Some unexpected news perhaps.

Someone turning you down.

Not getting the job you thought you would.

Whatever it is, you didn’t see it coming.

And now, what?

What do you do?

I had one of those punches yesterday.

I call it, the mid size punch.

And it’s complicated.

You don’t know how to deal with it.

You feel like you can still work.

Make dinner. Go about your daily routine.

With the bruising still happening. The leftover pain.

When I got that mid size punch it was on a Wednesday.

I thought to myself, nooooo I need today to be Saturday.

Then I would have a longer waiting room day.

Feeling sorry for myself, day.

I could write about it. Cleanse it.

Have a pity party.

Did you know I love having them?

Yes. I do. They are such an important part of our healing.

When you don’t take care of that mid size punch, the leftover pain becomes a low grade anxiety, that goes and finds your bigger anxieties and latches on.

Imagine over the years all these punches we had to endure finding their way to the inner mothership of anxiety.

Because that was the only thing they could do since there was no other exit.

And this is why…

Life is meant to be processed, cleansed, talked about and felt. 

Anything else is poison. (Click to tweet!)

So, here’s to cleansing our mid size punches and making sure to join our own pity parties whenever necessary.

It’s our human right.

It really is.

The opposite never ends well.

With many needed pity parties.

Christina

P.S Oh and make sure you listen to this week’s solo Dear Life Podcast, on Dating. Shhhhhh.

Listen right here.

I realized that my aging is more physically evident lately. 

It is like a beautiful weathered house on the water. 

It looks different when it’s been there a lifetime vs when it’s brand new. 

Even if the owners took care of it in every way, the many gatherings, celebrations, transitions and of course the ocean splashing all over it, has made it look different. 

I don’t think the word older is relevant to the house on the beach or to ourselves. 

A word such as transformed is closer to the meaning of who I am becoming. 

I looked at my face the other day and I saw so many new layers of living on it. 

My body also looked not just heavier but more at home, it was as if it was telling me I am not going back to being smaller. 

My body was changing along with me. 

Making sure I knew that we were a team. 

Body and mind. 

At first, you go to war with your body, trying to make it go back to the way it used to look, but it always wins. 

It has to match our inner growth and unfortunately our inner worlds carry with them a hard life. I have never met anyone without a hard life. 

Without the ocean falling on them every day. 

Without trespassers taking advantage of the living room, kitchen and deck every day. 

We have been explored, rejected, abandoned but also loved, and adored. 

And love leaves bigger marks. 

Because we will always lose love and that is the biggest wave the ocean hits the house with. Our so called aging comes from losing the loves of our lives, never getting a second chance at the same memory. 

Another round of kisses and conversations under the moon. 

If you are reading this in your 20s or 30s and think this doesn’t pertain to you, know you too have already lost so much. You have weathered storms, and crashing waves. 

If you are reading this and you are in your 80s, 70s, 60s, 50s and you are saying in your quiet voice, oh Christina you just wait until you get here how much older you will look. 

I hear you. I am in the beginning of a long aging process. 

But I deeply believe that even when the biggest wave of my life hits me, one that I cannot survive, I will close my eyes so fast and leave my body even faster than the wave can find me. 

On to the next life journey, somewhere else with the same friends but with different names. 

With the same witness but with another body to shape over the years. 

I just hope I have a knowing, a remembering not of the waves, but of my relentless perseverance to find the calm between them. (Click to tweet!) 

My passion for sitting on the wet deck under the rainbow, the sand drying out but sticky enough to build sand castles even for a day. For an evening. 

And my gearing up for the next day waiting to be transformed into whatever was next. 

Just like my eagerness for the next time I get the chance to ‘age’ and blanket my inner self with the world. 

 

With many waves and many lives, 

Christina 

P.S This week’s podcast was about everything that has to do with our life and loss. With Dr. Rick Hanson. He also had this deeply healing voice. I hope you take us for a walk this weekend. Listen HERE.

I wasn’t planning on it but I just spent a whole week truly being myself. 

I didn’t care about pleasing anyone. Not even one. 

I said whatever was on my mind. 

I was myself 100%. Full on. 

And then it hit me. 

I realized that when you show up fully, with no guilt, no shame, no worry about what anyone may be thinking about you. 

When you just rebel against the version of yourself that was slightly altered to fit in.

You recognize that it takes a lot out of you.

I went from slouching to sitting up straight. 

From driving 45 miles per hour to hitting the fifth gear.

The exhilaration of being yourself is actually hard work for the brain that is used to running on half of what made you, you. 

Oh my Lord. 

I was living with a lot of my windows closed. 

So I opened them all at the same time. 

Do you know what else I discovered? 

All the meaningless worries vanished. 

I was too busy expressing myself to worry about how my expressions were landing on others. 

I even forgot to judge myself. 

I went from one truth to another. 

From one open window to the next. I felt alive. Tired but alive. 

I spent my week, also shaking my head. 

How could I have squashed myself even a little?

How do we convince ourselves to mute our voice for the mother in law who doesn’t like us? 

For the stepdaughter who can’t care less if we are dead or alive. 

For the stranger who sits at the cubicle next to us at work. 

I know you have had some of your windows closed too. 

Now we move forward. Opening as many windows as possible. 

But anyone who is still looking for the half person you used to be, is not for you. 

Be ready to shed relationships. 

And don’t give your full version of yourself to anyone who doesn’t deserve you. 

Don’t waste your time. Pull back immediately if you feel anyone disapproves of your wholeness. Don’t even consider it. 

I am all about giving people second chances, but there are times when a second chance should not be an option. 

Bottom line is that the people who disapprove of your way of life, should not be in it. (Click to tweet!)

You cannot risk having to shut those windows again. 

Here’s to a week with bright light, and sun coming through your big gorgeous windows. 

Can you see me waving at you from the house across the street? 

 

With an honest life,

Christina

P.S. The Dear Life Podcast has been growing and growing, thank you for listening. If you haven’t yet started, one of my favorites is Jane Green’s episode. You will want to open all your windows afterwards for sure. LISTEN HERE.

Why is it so darn hard to stop and tend to our sorrow during a hard season? 

And why does it feel so unnatural to be sad?

Why isn’t our society able to help us heal?

No wonder we find it difficult to take time off work, or let go of our responsibilities. 

It is like we are being dragged by a fast moving train and we won’t let go of the railing. Because if we did, what would people think of us? 

What would happen to all the things and all the people who are on that train? 

Who would fuel the train and keep it going if we had to take a break? 

Who would carry the load if we could not do it. 

Dare we even ask anyone? 

Dare we say I am sorry but I need to take time off? 

We even convince ourselves that we don’t need it. 

I sure did this week. 

We feel shame even asking for some time to be with ourselves, and hold our own hand during a tough transition. 

Whatever that may be. Empty nest. Divorce proceedings. 

Someone dying on us. A tough medical diagnosis. 

An argument with someone in our lives. 

A tough day at work. Whatever it is we are struggling with. 

We don’t let go of that train. 

So we get back to life with a limp. 

We get back on that horse while we are injured. 

Sure we make it work. 

But nothing heals the right way. 

And we wonder where anxiety comes from. Well, let’s look no further. 

Anxiety is the injury that didn’t have time to heal. 

It’s the echo of the silent crying. 

The voice that is never allowed to speak. 

I know, I know I sound dramatic.

But this world we live in, is no place for vulnerability. 

No wonder Brene Brown became so famous with her work. 

But even after all these years of her saying it, writing, speaking it we still live in a world that won’t let us off that train when we are broken hearted. 

Something tells me that a kinder, softer world may not be coming anytime soon. 

I am sorry.

But I can’t give us fake hope. 

What would be the point of telling you that one day we will all live in a world that sees grief as a sign of strength and intelligence? 

But I am going to say something else. 

And it is why I am still here fighting for us. 

Maybe the kind and compassionate world we seek can only be created in smaller groups. 

A tight knit community. 

Where we have a common goal, and similar beliefs. 

These days I keep myself in circles with people I feel comfortable with. 

With people who don’t believe in perfection, they have had tons of loss and are mostly as strange as I am. 

I hope this letter is reminding you of two things. 

Slow down when you are sad. 

And find people who will make you feel OK when you do. 

Sometimes it can be that simple. 

Here’s to a slow day if your heart is hurting. 

And to finding a group of people who know what that’s like. (Click to tweet!)

 

With a much needed slower pace, 

Christina 

PS. I interviewed Neale Donald Walsch this week on the podcast. When you listen, it will feel like the whole world slowed down. Listen here: http://www.dearlifepodcast.com/episodes/ep68

PPS. Class registration closes this Sunday: www.thetempleeffect.com

Lately, I realized that I will never stop writing about longing and loss. 

I see everything from a transient perspective. 

I am in love with the moment, because it is so fleeting. 

I see everything from the end. 

When I witness people in the later stage of life, I see the goodbyes they had to say. 

The many selves they had to abandon. The many people they lost.  

The jobs. The hobbies. Their favorite chairs. Tables. 

A room they loved in a house they lived in.

It is almost as if I see the life that is not there, but was. 

This week I am saying goodbye to a big chapter of my life. 

A self I have occupied for many years. 

My youngest daughter left for college. 

And now, I have to say goodbye to the woman who raised two daughters without their dad.

Goodbye to all the choices she made through that identity.

To the woman she had to become so she could be both mother and father. 

I have to tend to every invisible loss she is experiencing. 

All of the many parts she had accumulated during the last 20 years, are being disassembled. They are on their way out the door. 

I have names for all the pieces that are leaving her. 

The biggest piece is called reliable. 

Another, fathering. 

I will miss the everyday togetherness I had with my daughters

Their daily presence, and laughter. 

Our daily drives to school. 

The movie nights, the kitchen hang outs. 

Who I was at home with them. 

Every time we end a chapter we mourn many invisible parts of ourselves. 

We have to see them all, name them, and acknowledge their role in our lives. 

It will take me weeks, maybe even a whole year to see all the parts of me that will be forever lost. So many pieces won’t make the next chapter. 

Maybe I will be completely gone. 

As I am writing this I realize what a big part of me was about raising the girls. 

Bigger than I ever thought. 

And as the pieces are flying out of the door, it feels quiet now. 

Empty of the toughness I had mastered to be a strong mother. 

The old life is fading away and with it, a new life is crawling in. 

I don’t know what it will be like. 

I have never been here before. 

What I do know is that I love being a beginner. 

Finding my way to a life for myself. 

It’s been a long time coming. (Click to tweet!)

 

With beginner’s luck,

Christina 

P.S. During the last two weeks I had two extraordinary podcast guests that know about beginnings and endings very well. Best selling novelist Jane Green will make you fall in love with her and her many books. And Tracey Harris, my favorite artist of all time. You can find both their interviews here.

The other day, someone asked me something important. 

She said…”Christina, do you have any words for those of us who started this journey not quite as young as yourself. Those of us, who may only have 10 or less years to live.  If I was younger, I think I would have more hope to be happier one day, but the years left are few and I can’t find any joy in the upcoming blankness of my future.”  

I wanted to answer this question fully and dedicate a whole letter to it. 

As I have been asked this many times before. 

My first husband was diagnosed with stage four colon cancer when I was 30 and he was 31.

I was widowed at age 34. I am now 48 years old. 

Being thrusted upon tragedy so early on it catapulted me to a very different timeline. 

It sped everything up. 

I was aging emotionally much faster than the people in my life who were the same age as me. I was experiencing things that only much older people had experienced. 

I had more things in common with a 70 year old woman than I did with a 30 year old. 

I have said this before and I will say it again, grief lives outside of time and space. 

It takes you out of the normal linear timeline and puts you in a timeless experience. 

In many ways I have felt much older in my mind for quite some time now. 

So I feel I could speak to this question about older age and loss. 

If I was much older and I had just a few years left to live after his passing…I have to tell you..

I would have very few material things. 

Possibly living in a small home or apartment. 

I would have plants everywhere. Inside and outside. 

I would invest in my favorite mugs so every morning’s coffee would feel really special in my hands. I would read every day and I would immerse myself in the stories I found on the pages of the books. I would be taken away by them. I would write a lot too. 

Possibly my best books. 

I would spend a lot of time on my own. I do love my own company now. 

I would paint all the paintings I never got the chance to paint when I was younger and was working so hard. My monthly expenses would be very few. 

I would probably spend most of my money on books, paint brushes and coffee mugs. 

If I had extra, I would find a way to give it to someone who didn’t have what I had. 

I would visit the church. 

Maybe even find many different churches to visit. 

And if my health allowed me to travel I would either drive myself, fly or get on buses to faraway places with groups of people the same age as me. 

I would find joy in the smallest moments of my life. 

I would observe the world going by. 

I would find out about people’s lives and try to help them solve their problems. 

I would take myself to the movies. 

And maybe even try to be an extra in one. I know right? Why not. 

If I needed to make extra money to live and I didn’t have my book writing to support me. I would work at a local coffee house. 

I would be very grateful to have had the life I had. 

Especially for the parts of my life that I took for granted. 

The everyday stuff. 

Whenever I would feel afraid about dying I would go and remind myself about all the things I know about death. And get excited about experiencing it. 

After all, by then I would know many people who have already passed. 

In the last 14 years since the loss of my very young husband I fell in love with my inner self. 

She keeps me so busy. 

I identify very much with Henry Miller’s words. 

“Some day I am going to own a few feet of earth somewhere and put a house over it. 

Just one big room will do. A stove. And a basin of water. 

A huge desk. A bookcase and an easel. 

Then life can go rolling by, and what floats in through my door will be sufficient for me.” 

The simplicity of what he described is my joy. 

Tragedy doesn’t scare me as much any more. 

So my answer to the question about age, living fully after loss late in life can be summed up with feeling grateful to still be alive and finding my way through a normal day. 

A day with a book, a flower, a tomato from my garden and a good mug of coffee. 

I would own two pairs of jeans. A black tshirt. Or two. 

Flip flops for the summer, sneakers and a pair of boots for the winter. 

My hair would be short. The shortest possible. 

Finally I would say yes to that short hair do I always wanted. 

I would hope to have a few good friends so I could gossip with them. 

And finally, I would feel so wealthy. 

When money, or success or any kind of appearances mean not much. 

When I won over my anxieties by detaching from any kind of wanting, but just being grateful for the sun in the sky and the ground that holds my life together. 

I will die a free person. 

And that freedom of needing nothing takes away any sorrow or blackness. 

The sooner I can get to Henry Miller’s dream life the happier I will be. 

I never imagined that my goal in life would be to have less, to want less. 

Oh and one more thing before I end this letter, I love animals. 

I would have as many animals as possible. 

They remind me of the innocence I lost so early on in my life. 

So to the person who asked me that question I hope you know that being here with ten years left to live can bring to you the most divine moments of your life. 

Keep your life simple. Keep yourself present. 

And smile looking outside your window marveling at the birds, the trees and the big blue sky.

It is all for you! (Click to tweet!)

 

With so many mugs of coffee,

Christina

P.S I am finally teaching the The Temple class this fall. I am sorry it took so long for me to run this class again. For anyone who has lost someone they loved and want to connect to the world beyond this one. Register here: www.thetempleeffect.com

Today’s letter was not coming.

A day such as this, had never happened before.

For the last 520 Fridays, every week, without a miss, a letter would always come through for you. Today was different.

It was as if it was trying to get me to notice the silence. The quiet.

I’m sitting here just waiting to write.

Maybe this is what was needed today.

You see, the only reason I have had the courage to write this letter for the last ten years, was because I never thought I was the one writing it.

I was just the transcriber.

It was God. The universe. The energy. The force.

Everything but me.

And today after 520 Fridays the letter didn’t show up.

I was left here alone, sitting. Looking for the words.

Thinking to myself, what if it doesn’t show up.

What will I send?

So after sitting here for hours I just started writing about this moment.

Right here.

After all, it has always been about what is.

Hasn’t it?

And trusting that.

Not questioning if it is enough.

It is what it is.

Have I ever told you that at the cemetery where my husband is buried, right across from him is a headstone that says it is what it is. In big letters.

So every time I would visit I had to read it. It was right there staring at me.

At first I would get mad. Angry.

How fitting. In a cemetery.

It is what it is.

I must have read it a thousand times.

At some point I started to agree. I had to.

What else was left for me to do.

It was what it was.

So wherever you are, if you are feeling that you don’t have what you need, do what I did today.

I took what was here and trusted that it was enough.

We do what we can, with what we have.

That has always served me well, especially during the hardest days of my life. (Click to tweet!)

Put one foot in front of the other.

And one more thing.

Even if all I got today was to tell you how much I care, and how much you mean to me I would have sent it with just those words.

And it would have been enough.

With all I have, and everything I am,

Christina

P.S. This week’s conversation is with Dr Amit Goswami about life, death and healing. It is not to be missed. Listen here.

How do we find love while in quarantine? 

While in isolation.

What happens to those who have yet to meet their first or second soulmates.

They dreamed of meeting them at the library, at the bookstore, at the cafe, at the pub. 

At conferences, at work. 

They never dreamed of meeting them at home. 

What happens now? 

How do we find our way to each other when we are not supposed to be together? 

Nobody speaks of this kind of loss. 

The loss of not meeting your future love. 

Because you can’t run into each other. 

You can’t cross paths. 

This kind of loss can tilt the axis of the earth. 

Almost like a Romeo and Juliet story. 

Our imaginary worlds of true love are now threatened to never come true. 

I have not read or seen anyone referring to this kind of loss. 

Just because it is not the loss of a person who you have already met, it doesn’t mean it is not a loss. It is the loss of the person we were supposed to meet. 

The love that was waiting for you, somewhere in the future. 

Especially for those who have already lost someone they loved. 

Or for those who were left by their husbands or wives. 

Those with broken hearts. 

They were looking for their new loves, everywhere. 

But now the everywhere that belonged to them is shut down. Closed up. 

The libraries are closed. The cafes too. The restaurants are gone. 

We have to learn a different kind of finding love. 

Ok, my darling, listen up. 

We have to start imagining new ways of meeting. 

I know you dreaded meeting someone online. 

The dreaded online dating. 

But what does it really mean to meet someone online? 

We have to redefine it. 

We have to see it as a vast universe of possibilities. 

Now you get the chance to visit with someone in Iceland if you wished, without having to visit the Blue Lagoon. 

You could start a relationship with someone in France, Spain, Australia. Norway. 

Oh my world. All these different ways someone can call you my love

Mon amour. Mi amor. Min kjærlighet

If I was single I would feel my heart’s joy, my eyes would open wide. 

And I could imagine a soulmate as far away as the furthest corners of the earth. 

Our souls have always been non local. 

Deep down this is more natural than we think it is. 

Listen, and remember this. 

We will all one day go back to visiting our local worlds. 

Back to the neighborhood cafes and restaurants. 

Meeting a partner from Iceland or New Zealand may not feel as natural as it feels right now. 

Seize the moment of this non local world. 

Imagine your future love waiting for you somewhere in a beautiful country. 

Go on, go online, post your selfies and tell the world about yourself. 

Seek to find a new love in a non local version of life. 

Falling in love first, with each other’s souls. 

After all, this is how we met each other. 

Non locally. 

Isn’t it?

So…what are you waiting for. 

 

With non local love,

Christina 

P.S. I did a two minute podcast to tell you good morning. Listen Here.

I think it’s nostalgia. 

That sweet feeling made out of longing. 

Remembering the days at the beach, in our youthfulness. 

Laughter echoing in the sand, staying present in everything. 

The younger we were, the less real the past was. 

The less needy we were of the future. 

We just naturally stayed in the moment, without knowing we were in the most unending time of our lives. 

I don’t grieve my youth, I grieve the ease in which I lived in my youth. 

And now, well now it’s not that we no longer laugh, or have new memories, it is that we don’t lose ourselves in those moments. 

We have forgotten how to lose ourselves. 

It is divine you know? 

The losing of oneself. 

Pure divinity. 

I remember it well. 

And why I love being nostalgic. 

The romance of remembering the details of a regular day. 

The routine of seeming nothingness, oh God. 

The luxury. 

My walks back from the beach in the burning sun, running home. 

The new friends I made on a summer’s day, while hanging next to the ocean. 

Never to see them again. 

The people who sat next to me on flights. 

Where we told each other everything, only to wave goodbye knowing that was the end. 

My wet shoes from the rain in Northern England when I would take the bus home. 

I was just 18. 

I am nostalgic of all the moments of my life where I just lived, without any wishing or dreaming, just living a regular life. 

Being lost in the weather, the ocean, the normalcy. 

Oh the normalcy. I miss that the most. (Click to tweet!)

Almost as much as I miss my innocence. 

Now that is a perfect day. 

You see, this is why I love being nostalgic, it heals me. 

In so many ways. With so many rememberings. 

After all, life is the infinite cycle of learning and unlearning of the one and only truth. 

Letting go of one self in the midst of a normal day. 

The biggest gift we could ever receive. 

The hardest thing to hold on to. 

 

With nostalgia,

Christina

P.S. I did a 3 min Dear Life episode just for you. Listen here.


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