Happy New Year (It's a Jubilee Year)

I was speaking with a friend who is returning to their art of painting, and as they shared some of their pieces with me, I recognized it as abstract art. It caused me to think of this blog, where a lot of the images on this site are from searching for abstract art, and I realized that I have really left this blog, and therefore a huge and meaningful section of my work, hanging.

When I moved to a new website, I did link it in my last blog post here, but for financial reasons, I shut that site down, so that link is no longer working, and hasn't been for well over a year. I have also now entirely removed that link from the post.

As such, I wanted to link my Substack to this site, to help people find my newer work. 

Check out my newer writing on my Substack.

Peace and love, 

Carly

Photo by Turgay Koca

Come Meet Me Over Here

Greetings my wonderful readers!

This marks the end of the activity on this blog. I am inexplicably grateful and amazed at the work I did on this site. Publishing this last post in January 2022, makes it a near perfect 10 years from my first post in January 2011. There are over 500 posts on this site, all chronicling my spiritual, and as of the past year and a bit, wellness journey. 

I have absolutely treasured this blog. In its early years, I would post and edit articles for days afterward. This blog was just a couple of months old when I showed it to a business owner and got an admin job based almost solely on my writing skills. Sadly that job didn't work out, but what does remain is the beautiful memory of an executive being deeply moved and appreciative of my writing abilities. 

I am amazed at the commitment I showed to this blog, and so grateful for the natural ending of it. I know I tried to close this blog last December, which would have also been acceptable in my mind, number wise; a tribute post in January truly would have made it a perfect 10, being 2011-2021, but there was still more work to do. I had to keep hold of it whilst I built up my new website and my brand, and then lose it in the spirit of financial health, and start again.

Happy New Year, and see you on the flipside 💗🙏

Being Worthy in and of Myself

One of my hardest lessons the past year was in frugality. Balancing my financial scale was like breaking an addiction. There was frustration, tears, conflict, and even moments where my body experienced a sort of ache. Coming to terms with the truth of my financial situation, basically that I was living in deficit, was both cathartic and painful. But so worthwhile. It took just over a year to truly get my feet planted on the ground, and to mentally change my thinking around money. This also included an acceptance of my social status, and what that realistically permitted without going into enormous debt.

I used shopping and salons to conceal my feelings of inadequacy and shame, and that ultimately began a cycle of then not having the funds for what I really needed, the basics of a heathy life, even things as simple as a nutritious meal. I had to learn how to be happy with what I had, or to get what I wanted at a lesser cost. I went from shopping at expensive department stores to shopping at thrift stores. I still struggle with this today, but through the help of strong people in my life, I can put my desires and fears into perspective.

The absolute most crushing reality is not pursuing my academic interests. I work through this by making due with the resources I currently have, and I have some incredible resources, if only I apply them. So I practice mindfulness, and remind myself that maybe someday, I can study what I want, where I want, when I am in a position to responsibly do so. It is better to live within my means and have the money for what I need, instead of attaining a certain status at the cost of my wellbeing.

In my new lifestyle of learning how to live minimally, slowly, and without debt, I had to, and continue to have to, learn about humility. I have to be okay with what I have, which is really not easy when my first addiction of “not enough”, in the form of alcoholism, taunts me by saying those boots won’t make it through another winter, or people won't respect me without updated and expensive accessories, or that I can’t stop biting my nails if I don’t have an expensive overlay that requires bi-weekly professional maintenance.

It has hurt to accept my current lot. My shifting of priorities had to happen, because I was sick and tired of hitting financial bottoms. Even still, my delusions of grandeur seem to be intrinsic, and run very deep within my psyche. I still hit walls today where I have to practice acceptance; I allow myself brief indulgences of self-deprecation as I sort through the feelings of disappointment when I realize I can’t make certain purchases. But I don’t stay in that place for long, because that place is a void that will snuff out the spark within me that has the potential of one day becoming a flame.

Therefore, practicing gratitude has been a go-to tool to get me through the harder moments of my financial recovery journey. I am grateful for what I do have, and for the people in my life who keep me focused and on-track. I am amazed at how much I have grown since the end of 2020 when I took my first step on this journey by not signing a contract for a new phone, and by choosing to use the phone I already owned and to instead just pay for the service.

I also stopped comparing myself to others, especially others who grew up having money. Once I accepted my present and my past, I was able to not only appreciate what I either naturally had, or what I attained up until this point, and to say, “That’s nice for them.” In this exercise I began to deepened my own self-love. I began to recognize my own beauty, and to be thankful to my family for instilling certain values in me that I can best recall when I’m not lost in the luxuries of the world.

For me, the levelling of my pride that leads to a sick financial state is a daily reprieve. So while I have balanced my bank account, I still must conscientiously work on my financial health with the same dedication as I do my physical and mental health. I used money to fill a God-sized hole which is currently being filled with gratitude, acceptance, perspective, and hope, but I work on the premise that hole is still there, and can get empty without a daily renewal of my mind.

It’s not easy to be in this world, but it’s getting easier to love myself despite the messaging all around me, saying I need things outside of myself to be loved. It has been a challenging lesson to get to this point. My partner Mike helped me the most to get on this track and my best friend Lisa helped me stay on it as she shared her wisdom which helped fortify me as I continued to grow. Getting financially healthy is not something I could have done on my own. I needed others to inspire me, such as people who live debt-free and who have slow-living and minimalism mentalities.

Thank you to 2020 and now as we close another year, 2021, for presenting me with so many incredible life instructions to heal this trauma of over-spending, and to all of my friends both online and offline, for being bright lights of passion and support, especially my academic friends who don't give up sharing ideas, even during this time of suppressed information, and to God for reminding me that I am His child, beautiful and worthy in and of myself, not needing the wealth of a passing world to validate me.

Love This Moment by Pooja Grover

A Gentle Reminder to Myself

 As I study for my next level of certification as a health coach, I was taken aback by a joke made by the instructor in the video. In her reference to Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, she drew a line at the bottom of the pyramid to have wine at the base. She said she hopes we don't mind that she altered the theory, and that everyone needs a glass of wine now and then. It caused me to think about my alcoholism, and was a great reminder that a very small percentage of the population actually live with this mental illness. I realized that it's my need to continually be present with my alcoholism, because in honoring it, I am living in both authenticity and gratitude. It is in these realms where I am the most happy. 

After having moved in with my partner, in a basically open concept home, I have had a huge paradigm shift in my life. I have never lived so closely with someone before, and as a result I am not doing as much independent work. To add to this, I haven't been going to my AA meetings after a Covid scare at my work near the end of the summer, which caused me to take half a week off while I waited for my negative test result, bringing me very much back to the reality that we are still in a pandemic, and contact tracing is not something I am wanting to participate in.

In all of this, I have become almost one unit with my partner, as well as only catching a few online AA meetings here and there. It has therefore been challenging to identify as an alcoholic, especially as I recently celebrated 8 years of sobriety, and having had a spiritual awakening don't really grapple with this condition today. Yet this is something I never want to be far away from, because I know that I have a mental disease in remission, not cured. I love identifying as an alcoholic, it brings me back to my roots, and makes my life make sense. It is a privilege to be recovered, and not a reason to disconnect. 

Today I have learned self-compassion, as taught by Kristin Neff, and I have also lived through so much the past year, most notably my rejection of pharmaceutical medication, and moving through grief. These obstacles overcome makes these pandemic challenges much more easy to put into perspective. "This too shall pass" was an axiom I couldn't wrap my head around until even recently, but today, I know that it's true. 

Finding ways to be present in isolation has been manageable, and it all returns to a one day at a time philosophy that my program of recovery taught me. A program that I can apply to all facets of my life today - a life that I am now proud of because of certain Steps I took and continue to take daily. Learning to live honestly and within my own means has been challenging, but very rewarding and healing. I am learning self-mastery, and a necessary component of that has been acceptance of what I cannot change, and in those areas courage to change my thinking, so that I can live in grace. 

Mindful ‘YOU’ Peaceful ‘YOU’ by Pooja Grover

Meditations on the Resurrection

As we enter the season of Advent in the Church - that is, the time of preparation for the birth of Jesus, I've continued since the season of Lent - the time of preparation for his death and resurrection, to contemplate his resurrection. This year, with my dad's passing, the resurrection was more pivotal. I felt desperate to believe in the resurrection, but my rational mind could not truly accept it. I continued my journey into blatant heresies, so far removed to be even recognizable to traditional Christian doctrine, and I continued to feel dejection. 

But as I moved in accordance to God's grace in this recent feast day of Christ the King, I began a new meditation as prompted by one of my favourite apologists, Bishop Robert Barron: is Christ truly the king of my world? As I mentally moved through the checklist, contemplating behaviour change to denote an affirmation, I found a new confidence, and a new relief. I was reminded of a simpler time in my not so distant past, where reliance and trust in God more than sufficed, it enraptured me, and assured me that I was safe and provided for.

It was in my recommitment to the Church that I was given my first glimpse of the reality of the resurrection, which has come to me through clemency, consistency, and heartache. In considering the pandemic, and all of my shortcomings and defeats the past 20 months, I questioned if I lost, or if I am going to lose. But I recalled the teaching that we are victorious in Christ. Through our adoption we become co-heirs - conquers through the resurrection. 

I have never had trouble identifying with what the cross represents, especially as a codependent with boundary challenges, but the glory of the resurrection, I could never bring myself to even consider. As I finally felt a rejection of the good things in this world not just on a surface level, but on a deep gut-wrenching sense of loss and forsakenness level, I was able to find a glimmer of belief in the resurrection. I had a sense of relief that not only am I not lost, but I am untouchable. 

It is in the fantastical nature of the resurrection that I defeat death and his minions that try to lord in every aspect of my life, and that in a pandemic, seem to win. Even if I can only connect to the resurrection as an idea and this point in my spiritual journey, it is all that is needed to remain triumphant in Christ. How else could I go from feeling truly downtrodden and defeated, to encouraged and revitalized, unless to believe that I am victorious.

This world would have me believe that I am worthless, that I am a victim of my traumas and my circumstances, and that I cannot change. The ruler of this world manipulates people to believe the lies of consumerism and violence, of fast living and disregard for the planet and all life on it. In the death of, and now I see, resurrection of Jesus, we are invited to slow down. To act in dignity and to choose right over wrong, no matter our fears of what others might think.

Today I profess that whether a person believes it or not, whether it's socially accepted or not, the resurrection, in a most mystical way, is a fact. Nothing, including my hyper-logical mind, can further deter me from this reality. I have relieved those who I have envied from the job of blinding my convictions with the morality of the world, and in that, I replace Christ as my King and final authority over my life, especially my afterlife.

Photo by Pisit Heng on Unsplash

Eight Years (The Only Way Out is Through)

Today I am 8 years sober, so I wanted to commemorate this day with 8 ways that sobriety and the Twelve Step program of Alcoholics Anonymous has transformed my life:

    1)  I have become consistent and reliable
    2)  I am able to connect to myself, to others, and to God
    3)  I have learned to ease my fears of not belonging or not being accepted
    4)  I have learned how to speak my truth and advocate for myself
    5)  I have become empowered to live honestly

    6)  I have been reconciled to my friends and family
    7)  I have fostered strong female friendships
    8)  I have learned how to be accountable, and to not be a victim

Three years ago, when I received my five-year medallion, I was in a lot of emotional pain. Family drama, low self-esteem, and apathy, made the year or two leading up to that accomplishment a perpetual taunting of relapse. By grace and stubbornness, I made it through, and my only message that night was to not give up. The statistics for relapse in the first five years are huge. For every five-year medallion, 45 one-year medallions are handed out. In this pandemic, that number is probably higher now. 

To make it to a state where relapse is less and less likely, requires a long and hard-fought resolution. Willpower is but a renewable resource, and can be recharging when we need it the most. This is just the way it is, and why as a health coach we are trained to not rely heavily on it. In these most desperately trying times, I have found acceptance of pain and suffering to be the only true remedy. We made a decision to not escape through intoxicants. It hurts in the moment, but it leads to an everlasting reward. As the psalmist wrote, “Weeping may stay for the night, but rejoicing comes in the morning.”

Eventually, those sober nights turn into sober days, sober days into sober weeks, sober weeks into sober months, months into years, then decades, until this way of living becomes the only normal one we truly know, and turning back on it becomes less and less likely. This is because as with so many other things, we are in a numbers game, and we eventually start to have wins in life. Gaining confidence in sobriety, we begin to understand that coping with losses via the bottle is no longer a viable option.

Getting to that point however, might take dark nights of the soul – the only way out is through. My message at 8 years is the exact same as it was at 5 - don't give up in those hard moments. We might feel lonely, ashamed, bored, excited, triggered, apathetic, depressed, confused, victimized...the list can go on, ad infinitium, but eventually we will come to understand that those are just feelings that we don’t have to avoid or be enslaved to. We can eventually learn to alleviate and even transmute these feelings, and being in them soberly, can enable that process.

Embrace Yourself - Be Happy "YOU" by Pooja Grover

On Forgiveness

“My people have been lost sheep. 

Their shepherds have led them astray

and turned them loose in the mountains. 

They have lost their way 

and can’t remember how to get back to the sheepfold. 

All who found them devoured them. 

Their enemies said, 

'We did nothing wrong in attacking them, 

for they sinned against the Lord, 

their true place of rest,

and the hope of their ancestors.'" - Jeremiah 50.6-7

In this passage from the prophet Jeremiah, verse 6 well describes generational trauma, and verse 7 helps explain how society, through various structures such as media, education, and religion, can normalize abuse and neglect, through the dehumanizing and blaming of the victims. In biblical days, justice was served by retribution, but when Jesus came, he offered a revolutionary way to live – to forgive.

What does it mean to forgive? I’ve been contemplating much about forgiveness, and what that looks like. My favourite understanding is to loosen the contempt in one’s heart. When I think about forgiveness, there seems to be different degrees of loosening. Sometimes it’s easy, and I can just accept a circumstance and walk away from it. Other times, it ties directly into my trauma and it’s not as easy to just move on from those offences.

Dr. Charles Stanley teaches that to have peace means to be tethered to God. This was a fascinating concept to me, and I went to the dictionary to confirm this. Lo and behold, the root word of peace is “pact”. When I am connected to a power greater than myself, greater in this case for attributes such as grace, understanding, compassion, humility, love, and forgiveness, I can better muster the courage and strength to encompass those traits myself.

When I am connected to God, for me that is through the person of Jesus as understood through a biblical worldview, I am better able to remove myself from the trauma-based victimhood that I seem to inherently come from, and can transcend to look for ways in which my offender might be suffering, and how that could be connected to their behaviour. It is in that space where I am safe to seek compassion and reconciliation, because I am tied directly to God, channeling that power of forgiveness.

It might take days, weeks, months, it might take a lot of prayer and meditation, and it might take the processing of very destructive thinking that wishes for retribution over forgiveness, but there has not yet come a situation where I cannot find the grace to immediately take a step back, find solace in God, and not do any harm back.

If I want to have real peace, for me that means to have courage, purpose, community, and expansion, I must learn to forgive, in every circumstance. I have found that God will offer me refuge to sort out the hurt, but I must seek to calm the storm within, and resist the temptation for payback. This is the only way to truly make a change for the better in my own life, and to be the change I want to see in the world overall.

Agnes Pelton, Untitled (1931)