Tag Archives: blogging

One Cheek in the Saddle

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Hello friends!  I live!

The blog is now two years old (celebratory post forthcoming).  Looking back, I have strayed often from the declared theme of patient-physician relationship and communication.  I have yet to figure out my optimum writing practice and discipline.  And every day the thing I long for most is to write for fun!  *sigh* Life.

If my world were a horse, happily trotting along a winding dirt trail in the Rockies, oblivious to my riding its back, then I would have fallen off multiple times from confusion, inexperience, fear, overreaction, awe, inattention, and impulse.  Sometimes I roll a ways down the hill, too.  The past two months or so have seen all of these and more.  Thankfully, as dust-covered and disoriented as I stand at times, the horse always allows me to remount.  At this point I’m about halfway back in the saddle again—one cheek on.  The next few posts will document my return to two-buttock riding.

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So much inner work done to date, and so much yet to do!  And I am infinitely grateful for the dense, strong, and unfailing network of support that surrounds me.  2017 could be my most productive and effective year yet, and I need help organizing.  So a couple weeks ago, I scheduled a session with my life coach of 12 years.

Her pre-call questions for me, and my spontaneous answers:

What do I want more of?

Connection, understanding, civil discourse.

To see people being kind to one another.

For people to truly listen to one another and try to understand each other’s points of view.

For us all to hold our shared humanity above all else, and see one another as fellow humans, all trying to make our way through an uncertain life.

Inner Peace.

Time outside, preferably in Colorado, in the mountains, but pretty much anywhere is good.

To write with purpose, discipline, and impact.

Integration—of everything I do, even the small things—for my Why to show up everywhere I go, with everybody I meet, most of all with my kids—to model the Why for them, in person and out loud.

To read primary literature, writings of the great thinkers and contemplatives, past and present.

Discernment—what is worth my time, contributes to my purpose, vs. what detracts from it?

Focus on what I’m for, rather than what I’m against.

Focus in general—to channel my energy to activities that align most with my central mission.  See Distraction below.

 

What do I want less of?

Rage and seething.

Repression of rage and seething.

Time wasted for lack of discernment.

Distraction.  I feel like Doug, the dog from the movie “Up”—Squirrel!  It all matters, but I cannot do everything at the same time.

 

What thoughts are uppermost in my mind these days?

The daily shit show that is our government and how it vexes me (see above, rage and seething)—sooo many squirrels.

I need to do something useful, to help, to contribute.

We are all in this together, we have to get through it together.

This is a test.  We can pass, and with flying colors, and only if we work together.

Every time I get angry, sarcastic, etc., I contribute to the negativity and morass.  I need to be better.

Why have I so much trouble walking the talk?  Why have I not achieved inner peace althef*ingready?

 

I present thusly to my trusted coach. The process always brings new insights, connections, and openings of mind and heart.  I plan to emerge on the other side of 60 minutes with increased clarity, confidence, and drive.  I’ll let you know! 😉

Oh yeah, and the Rules of Engagement also live, just taking an unplanned hiatus.  More of those to come, also.  Like I said, I’m only one cheek back on right now. 😉

 

 

NaBloPoMo, Here We Come!

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The Cubs have won game 5 of the World Series.  Halloween is tomorrow.  In two days I will commit to publishing a post a day for 30 days.  Woo hoooooooo, bring it!!  It’s been a year since I tried this the first time, and I almost made it—26, I believe, and a few may have been reblogs of others’ work…  I felt embarrassed about the ‘failure.’  But then I got through the A to Z Challenge by the skin of my teeth this past April (last post at 11:30pm on April 30th), and that was much more fun.  So I’m trying again, yaaay!

I launched this blog 18 months ago to address physician-patient relationship.  I aimed to discuss communication, self-awareness, and emotional intelligence, as tools to rekindle that trusting, continuous bond that so many of us miss in medicine today.  Since then I have come around to the original theme occasionally, but not nearly as often as I had intended.  So I take this annual blogging event as an opportunity to refocus and try something new.

For Na Bo Po Mo 2016, I intend to write 30 letters to patients.  Some will echo routine conversations; others may reflect my musings on this vocation.  I may examine observations on the state of medicine today.  Or other things, who knows?  I will at least attempt to convey my deep love for the work and the people.  Maybe I can help fellow physicians and patients connect, or perhaps lend some perspective and awareness.

There is a lightness to trial and error.  When you try something new, you make a commitment, set an endpoint, and decide how you will measure the outcome.  But you don’t have to attach yourself to a particular outcome, just the process.  I commit to try my best and have fun, and see what comes out, in fewer than 500 words per post.  I wonder where this will lead?  Maybe it will turn into a monthly newsletter for my own patients?  A book?  A column somewhere?  Anything is possible!  I’ll never know until I try, and I like the openness of the adventure.

I hope you will visit often, and leave your thoughtful comments.

Let the journey begin!

 

Playing My Part

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Hello again, friends! Feels good to be back…  3 weeks since my last post of the Blogging A to Z Challenge, holy cow!  At the end I thought, ‘Hey, I can do this!  One post a week, no sweat!’  …And then crickets…  How Fascinating!

Though I have not posted in three weeks, I have written like mad, mostly journaling. Today I suddenly realized how much I have missed corresponding with my friends on paper.  How long it’s been since I wrote by hand to someone other than myself!  As I sat this afternoon and wrote, on stationery, with colored gel pens and stickers, to some of my best friends, a tremendous sense of connection and gratitude filled me.  Much of this post was born of those spontaneous letters to my fellow conscious, cosmic journeyers.

Given the awesome support network with which I am blessed, I feel an impulse to do something more with my writing—to amplify and project all this love and connection back out onto the world for some positive purpose.  But how can my words possibly make a difference?

The A to Z Challenge showed me that I have the capacity to write often and much—and to produce better-than-crap results! It also taught me that I can take more risks with my writing, in both format and content.  Now I want to take my writing a little more seriously, lend more credence to my own abilities.  In the framework of Simon Sinek’s Golden Circle, I know my Why: to cultivate positive and constructive relationships in every realm of life.  This blog is another What to my Why.  But since the Challenge ended, I struggle with the How.

I think night and day about so many things:

  • My own individual relationships—spousal, parental, sibling, other familial; colleague, patient, student, friend, stranger.
  • Relationships I observe between others, and their impact on those of us around them.
  • Healthcare and medicine in general, and specifically at my own institution—miracles, bureaucracies, opportunities and pitfalls.
  • Leadership and organizational culture—examples of effective and ineffective models, and what makes them so.
  • Social justice and discourse—with an urge for movement toward acceptance, inclusion, mutual understanding, and cooperation.
  • Education, parenting and role modeling—integrity, walking my talk, inside and out.
  • Physician self-care and care of one another—individual and system issues, and their interface.

What am I called to affect? I live a conscious life in all these realms, or at least I try.  I have opinions and positions on various issues, some which I hold with deep conviction.  And I struggle with whether and how to express them—for what purpose?

Finally, I have an idea. Though I have opinions and positions that I hold strongly, I plan NOT to use this blog to promote those views.  There are plenty of people doing that already, a multitude of voices trying to win one another over, or, more precisely, trying to drive one another into silence with ever louder, brasher, and more vociferous language.  My voice can be one of moderation—of collaboration, connection—maybe a bridge for a few who seek one…  Or maybe just one stilt among many others, helping to hold up one such bridge.  I will strive not to criticize or proselytize, not to berate, blame, shame, incite, or inflame; and also not to concede or abstain.  I can, at the same time, hold my positions with conviction and passion, and also listen for the convictions and passions of others.  I can practice curiosity and openness.  I can question, explore, Hold the Space, and stand strong and tall, without feeling threatened.  I seek others who strive to do the same.

Voices of moderation are muted these days. The great orchestra of discourse has lost balance and harmony.  The most strident strings, horns, and drums play for their own promotion, rather than as a contribution to a symphonic collective.  The resulting dissonance makes us want to cover our ears and run away.  In order for a symphony to engage and inspire, each player must not only know her own part and play it well, but also listen carefully for other players and their movement.  Maybe we can all do this a little better: maintain our own distinct voices, while integrating with those around us.  The best orchestra functions as one entity, breathing and moving in a quintessentially integrated fashion.

My instrument is language. The past seven weeks have shown me my part in the online verbal orchestra.  This blog is where I will practice, record, and offer my contribution, not to overpower any others’ words, but to meet, align, and resonate.  The harmony of consonant contrast plays on, somewhere.  Maybe I can help find and amplify it, so more of us may enjoy the music of life among one another.