You Can Get It If You Really Want

I am feeling a hodgepodge of things on this final day of July 2016:

1) GRATEFUL. So grateful for a life with so much meaning. Grateful for two healthy, smart, beautiful, funny and increasingly independent kids. Grateful for challenging work. Grateful for amazing friends. Grateful for a beautiful and comfortable home. Grateful for the path that led me to my home in Ashtanga yoga and the practice that makes me a better person every day.

2) READY TO SURRENDER. Yesterday in the car I heard one of my favorite Red Hot Chili Peppers songs, Under the Bridge. Ever have the experience of a song filling your being? I love that feeling, and it happened yesterday when I heard this song. Just now, when I looked at the blog post I wrote about that song back in 2012, I felt ready to do something I've been contemplating but haven't yet really managed to do: Surrender. Especially when it comes to my lovelife. Stop checking for wedding rings, stop drawing conclusions about people who fit my narrative, just fucking give up on being the one who is going to find me a partner. I'm not in charge. I want something different than anything I've had before, and if that is going to happen, it's going to come from a place of surrender, not search. Consider this my white flag, Universe. I surrender.

3) READY TO GET TO WORK. As I've mentioned before, I feel deeply compelled to change the way we treat people in our jails and prisons. Last night I sent an email to a professor I had years ago who now does work with prisoners on forgiveness. I love what he said in response: "Congratulations on your vision that justice within prisons is vital for a just society." Yeah it is. And I will work toward that vision. I already got signoff from my boss to put together a team to work toward this essential justice.

All this has me thinking of the serenity prayer: "God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference."

What has happened or what will happen in my lovelife, I have no ability to change. But I can, and I will, change policies and practices that retraumatize and dehumanize prisoners.

Just ask my friend Jimmy Cliff:

You can get it if you really want
You can get it if you really want
You can get it if you really want
But you must try, try and try, try and try
You'll succeed at last

Persecution you must fear
Win or lose you got to get your share
You've got your mind set on a dream
You can get it though hard it may seem now

You can get it if you really want
You can get it if you really want
You can get it if you really want
But you must try, try and try, try and try
You'll succeed at last

I know it - listen

Rome was not built in a day
Opposition will come your way
But the hotter the battle you see
Is the sweeter the victory now

You can get it if you really want
You can get it if you really want
You can get it if you really want
But you must try, try and try, try and try
You'll succeed at last

It will take time, it will take energy, it will take an incredible group of like-minded and committed individuals, but we will reform our jails and prisons. Mark my words.

The Things I Regret

Selfie with one of the beautiful birthday girls this weekend!

On the way home from practice this morning, I was so happy to hear my girl Brandie belting out this new number:

Ohhhhh ohhhh ohhhh oh-o-oh
Ohhhhh ohhhh ohhhh oh-o-oh

There’s a hole in my pocket where my dreams fell through,
from a sidewalk in the city to the avenue.
There’s a leak in my dam ‘bout the size of a pin,
and I can’t quite remember where the water’s getting in.

But when you’re wearing on your sleeve,
all the things you regret,
you can only remember what you want to forget.
You feel it tugging at your heart,
like the stars overhead,
‘til you rest your bones on the killing bed.

Let them roll over me.
Let them roll over me,
when I doubt you.

Let them roll over me.
Let them roll over me,
when I doubt you.

With the weight of the world resting on my back,
and the road on which I've travelled is as long as it is cracked.
But I keep pressing forward with my feet to the ground,
for a heart that is broken makes a beautiful sound.

I love me some Brandi in general, but that last line really got right to me. I had a call this weekend with a woman who delivered the unsugarcoated truth about where I am in my life and where my work is going forward. And there's a lot of work, some of which I'm really not sure how to go about doing. Like learning to receive, understanding that money is neutral, and finding more of a balance between being in my mind and being in my body.

I feel like I've been working at all of those things, but maybe that's part of the problem. Maybe it's about surrender rather than working? I don't know, but I'm trying not to take my to-do list as an indictment on my current station in this life:

I walk through my days like a ghost in a dream,
but the field carries on and my past follows me.
It’s hard moving on from the things you done wrong,
when they play in your head like an old fashioned song.

But when you’re wearing on your sleeve,
all the things you regret,
you can only remember what you want to forget.

Lonely miles,
without you.

Lonely miles,
without you.

Let them roll over me.
Let them roll over me,
when I doubt you.

Let them roll over me.
Let them roll over me,
when I doubt you.

Let them roll over me.
Let them roll over me.
Let them roll over me.
Let them roll over me.

Let the ground keep my faults.
Let the water be my home.
Let the dust hold my soul,
like a holy rolling stone.

Yeah. Let that happen. Maybe that'll help...