Reinventing Oneself And Filling The Void
Recently I decided it was time to reinvent myself. It was time for a full overhaul. I’ve done this many times and it has gotten me far in life. I went from a hard childhood to a full and happy life as a mother and writer. I have healed and grown. I have shifted so many times I can’t keep track. And here I am, very different than from even ten years ago. My close friends will attest to this.
This year the Tibetan Monks visited our town. They come every year and stay a few miles from my house. They have group healings and I attend every single one. Every year. I devour the healings and I am changed, my life is changed every year. My children went with me last year and my eldest was transformed, though he won’t admit it. I saw a vast improvement and a deep honesty with him. He is now a trans female and I believe the courage to be her truest self was found in those healings.
This year there were four intense healings and I showed up ready to go deep. I meditated and visualized like a champ. I sat through each long hour and a half and choked on the incense gratefully. I wanted every drop of that honey. I wore every string blessed by the Dalai Lama and continued the work at home. The changes came fast this time. We are only two and a half months into the year and I’ve rearranged everything from the house furniture to future plans.
When I take the kids to school, I have time to think. Today I went deep. I made honey wheat bread by hand instead of the bread machine, cleaned the house, and rewatched a Chef’s Table France episode all about Allan Passard. Allan Passard inspired me with his story of going from being a 3 Michelin star chef that was famous for his meat dishes but one day found he could no longer stomach working with animal flesh and walked away for a year to find himself anew. He discovered vegetables and came back to reinvent his cooking with only vegetables. He was mocked, lost customers, was told he was going to lose everything, but he found a new life in this sort of cooking and he wasn’t letting it go. He worked night and day to recreate menus and in the end he was successful. He is still a three Michelin star chef and has an amazing fruit and vegetable farm. He cooks almost entirely from his gardens. Today, fifteen years
It takes courage to reinvent yourself, especially when you’re in your fifties.
And there is the risk of failure at first and becoming insecure and returning to the old ways. The old life. We become frightened and doubt ourself so we return to what is safe and familiar. What is already firmly established. That usually turns into a big mistake. We left or chose to change for a reason and that reason doesn’t change.
The key to success at transformation is to empty yourself completey and then quickly fill up with good things, new things. If you empty a space and don’t fill it up, something will fill it for you and it may not be of your choosing.
I have been decluttering and purging for years. This includes stuff and relationships and old ways of living, eating, and thinking. Furniture, people, old journals, diet, negativity, and hustles.
Now I have space and light. It’s wonderful. Then it becomes awkward. I feel bored, I miss certain things and people. I feel nostalgic about things that I got rid of for a solid reason. I want to bring it all back. Why? Because I haven’t refilled the space with new things. I have empty rooms and it feels baren. The rooms need to be filled, decorated, painted, and a cozy fire built to warm it all up. This is figuratively speaking.
I need some space to remain calm and empty where I can have deep thoughts. But the rest must be replaced with new things.
I started thinking about money today. And my marraige. And our savings. Travel.
I was making bread by hand for the first time in what felt like a year. It felt good and the kneading and mixing acts as a therapist and I begin to pour out my thoughts. I thought about my marraige and what I don’t enjoy about it and then worried my bread would be bitter so I focused on happier thoughts and how much I missed working with dough. My bread may turn out bitter sweet. My food taste like my feelings.
I thought about my own poverty consciousness when making the beds. I went all the way back to my childhood to present and realized that I have never lived in abundance. My mother was a single parent that struggled with money and was horrible at budgeting. Then I struggled as a young adult working minimum wage and going to community colleges. At thirty I got myself in debt with in two years. I spent most of my thirties working three jobs to pay off the debt. Next was marrying a man who was an immigrant and made minimum wage and we chose for me to stay home with babies.
My big reads have been things like The Complete Tightwad Gazette and The Cheapskate. I wrote books on frugality. I lived frugality. I filmed frugality. I made money off frugality.
Maybe I’m tired of it. It’s a story that has come to its end. The curtain has dropped and the credits role. The End.
We have a big tax return on the way. Our first decision was to pay a big chunk on the mortgage, but now I’ve decided to take my kids on a trip to Europe. Life is short, kids grow up fast. I only have so much time with them until they fly off to college and have no time for old mummy.
The other day I packed away their computer and grounded them from YouTube and Gaming for at least a year. They are watching junk and learning things that are negative. They are talking about weird stuff or negative topics, celebrity gossip and getting all this misinformation. I had to clear it out. I have to clear it out for myself as well. But now I need to fill that space with something new and positive. Like travel.
For years we have been homebodies, living frugally. Our limited travel was driving to Oregon ever few years for a quick visit with our friend or visiting our friends in the Bay Area. When we travel to friends, I used to pack groceries and kitchen tools and do all the cooking for everyone and then clean the kitchen. I would make beds and keep things tidy out of respect for the hostess. I used to joke that when we go on vacation, I take my work with me. It’s not really a joke. I cook, clean and watch after kids on our vacations. I’m the eternal housewife and mother. Even on vacation.
The last few years we have been home and the biggest travel was to the library. We go out to eat once every few months. Usually lunch because it’s the most affordable. We grow food and planted orchards to have access to organics. I make everything from scratch.
I love my life and I wake up every day looking forward to the little things: my homemade espresso lattes, blogging my thoughts, listening to Opera on Pandora, and being home with the kids.
When I was making the beds, I felt fortunate to have such a charming and cozy home and I’m truly amazed that we did all this with such a little income. That is because I know how to work with very little money. I watched my mother struggle. She was highly educated with a college degree, a law degree and a nursing license. She was mentally unstable and couldn’t deal with the work force or people for extended periods of time. She eventually moved us up to the mountains in an isolated town with a gas station, cafe, corner market and post office. It was the 70s and she grew pot to make a living. This meant that we earned a large chunk of money once a year and had to make it last. She would usually start a home improvement project and spend it all at once, then wring her hands in worry until the next harvest. I have no idea how we got by but we always had a pot of roast or beans and rice on the stove and we always had a roof over our heads.
I had my own learning lessons with money and debt as a young adult. And because of that, I have become very good at working with very little. I know how to stretch a single income, how to earn extra money through a channel and writing books, how to forage and search for free goods and thrift shop. I have enjoyed every moment of it.
However, I’m feeling like it’s time to create more wealth. It’s time that I, as the great mother of this house, start doing good things for me. I want vacations where I get waited on and cooked for. I want to travel far, far away. Not to Oregon. To Europe. I want to get these kids out of here and see the world and see that it goes far beyond watching gamers on YouTube and the little dramas at the coop school.
And I want some luxury and opulence in our life. I want to meet interesting people and explore old cities.
We may have limited funds but once a year we have a tiny fortune from the IRS and it’s time to use it for fun. After years of working hard and preparing for hard times that never come, let us prepare for good times and great voyages and fun travel.
There are ways to travel well and not cost a fortune.
As I reinvent myself, I have to replace old ideas, old thinking and old habits. Einstein said, “We cannot solve our problems with the same level of thinking that created them.”
If you want a new life, you have to change everything, especially your old thinking and beliefs. It takes daily focus and practice.
For example, I want to be healthy, slim and fit. I watch plant based cooking videos and interviews with vegans and raw vegans to inspire me and learn to cook differently. I cleaned out my pantry, fridge and chest freezer and I filled it all with clean, plant based foods. Every time I go to the store I have to race by the chip isle and avoid the cookie isle. I settle into the produce isle and stock up in the grain and bean isle. I buy used vegan cook books and I have learned how to make everything from faux meat out of gluten or walnuts to gooey cheese out of silken tofu. I found a free Marcy Home Gym and saved up for a small elliptical. I found my old weights and washed them up.
I’m getting healthier and more fit every day. Still not slim, but it’ll happen, how could it not with all the lifestyle changes I’m making?
I wanted to get back to writing fiction so I started reading books on writing from good authors I respect. I went back to reading great fiction and I made up an action plan. I repainted and decorated my office. I removed unnecessary distractions. Then I did the hardest part. I got my bum in the chair and started writing.
Fifteen years ago I quit drinking and smoking. I moved to a new town, made new sober friends, did new sober activities, watched different movies, listened to different music, threw sober pot lucks, surrounded myself with everything clean and healthy, did the spiritual and emotional work to heal myself, changed my diet and exercise to heal my body and lungs. I threw myself into it 100% and it paid off. You couldn’t pay me to drink or smoke a cigarette today.
Everytime I changed a big part of my lifestyle, I had to remove something or several things and I had to replace them with other things that were matching the new lifestyle. I quit drinking and smoking and replaced them with a healthy diet and long walks on the beach with my dog. I lost old friends because party people don’t want sober people around, so I replaced them with healthy, clean living people.
Today I don’t want to live like a pauper anymore. I will always be wise with the money and frugality should help you thrive. Frugal means you live within your means so you have a stress free life and can ride the waves of recessions. It shouldn’t create an obsession with being cheap or poverty consciousness. I have realized I have that.
Today I made an old bread recipe. It’s honey wheat but I’m so cheap that I cut out the butter and honey to save money. I renamed it peasant bread. It should be called “dry as hell” bread. But today I felt rich and I added the honey and the butter and we have a moist, delicious bread for dinner with our soup.
It has started me on a new path toward great fortune and a rich life. I always say, don’t save the china and candles. Use the china even to eat the mornings eatmeal. Light the candles and have warm glow in the rooms. And now I add to that, use the honey and butter in your bread. Use that tax return to travel to Europe. Can you image how luxurious you will start feeling?
I feel excited and it has pulled me out of the doldrums.
Well, time to brew a little espresso and plan our trip.
