Thursday's Reflection: Second Wind

Sometimes when we are with friends and clearly it is time for the evening to end--we are all tired and we have had enough wine and have covered many topics--I will get my second wind. I revive and suddenly am ready for more conversation and connection. That can happen as we are standing at the door with our coats on or when my husband is clearing the dessert dishes. "Beware her second wind,"my husband says. I am not sure why it happens, but I know even when I am home alone or spending a quiet evening if I don't get myself to bed in order to have the needed eight hours of sleep, I am apt to get my second wind and will read or watch tv or write late into the night. I seem unable to stop doing whatever absorbs me, and I don't want to let go.

Sometimes that second wind is productive. 

This time of my life feels like a Second Wind. 

I have written in this blog lately about fullness, rather than busyness, and now I find myself evaluating most everything on those terms. 

Am I merely creating ways to be busy or is what I am doing adding to the fullness of my life, of my being?

Is what I am doing and how I am being adding to the fullness of the world? 

How will I use this second wind and let it use me?

A second wind seems different from a second chance, although there may be elements of that, but rather a second wind is energy  asking me to be more of the person I was created to be. A second wind asks "What is the new horizon in you that wants to be seen?" to quote John O'Donohue http://www.johnodonohue.com in To Bless the Space Between Us, A Book of Blessings. 

A second wind says I'm not done yet. 

One day when my mother was close to dying, but not yet confined to bed, my father was going through some drawers where she kept boxes of stationary and note cards, and he brought them to me and asked if I wanted them. That didn't seem like the best timing, but before I could respond, my mother said with more feistiness than we had seen in recent days, "I'm not dead yet." 

A second wind comes to remind us of life still unlived. 

Recently on a very cold night, we took our grands out for pizza. Peter, one of the wisest seven year olds, I know, and I were hustling from the car to the restaurant, and I commented that I was cold, hungry, and tired. His immediate response was "At least we aren't sick or dead, GrandNan."

I know he's right because I can feel a second wind blowing around and through me. I'm not sick. I'm certainly not dead, and in this time of freedom there are so many ways, essential ways, profound ways, to ride that second wind. 

Joan Chittister http://joanchittister.org in her book The Gift of Years, Growing Older Gracefully, doesn't use the words Second Wind, but I think she would approve. This is what she does say in the chapter about freedom:

          Freedom, in childhood, may be the right to be totally

          self-centered. In adolescence, I am engaged in the fine

          art of concentrating on myself, until I know who I am 

          and what I am capable of being. In midlife I am free to

          become skilled, to become prepared, to become expert,

          to become independent. But freedom in old age is the

          ability to be the best of the self I have developed during

          all those years. It is the freedom to gather everything I

          have learned up to this point and to put it to even more

          exciting use now. It is the freedom to give myself away

          to those who really need me, in ways I have never had the

          chance of doing before. I am free to be important to 

          people with real needs. And with that new role in life, I

          become one of those rare people who know what it takes

          to go through life, survive its dislocations, outlive its

          expectations, and negotiate its shoals…

               When I realize that freedom really is the right to be

          me, rather than someone else--perhaps for the first time

          in my life--the liberation of the soul begins. And with it

          the unshackling of the mind. I can become something

          new, as well as simply more of the old. Because what-

          ever path it was that got me here is not the only path I

          have ever considered, ever been fascinated by, ever

          wanted to explore. So, why not now, when the

          exploration is boundaried by both common sense and

          a lifetime of experience?  pp. 110-111

The last few years much of my energy has been spent coping with having a house for sale in Madison and buying a home here and doing all that is involved in moving and re-settling. I needed all the energy I could muster to do what was in front of me. Now, however, a second wind blows gently around me, calling me into a new time of creativity and authenticity. The freedom I have now is to embrace my second wind and see where it takes me. 

An Invitation

Do you ever get a second wind and if so, what do you do with it? Do the words "second wind" resonate with you as you think about this time of your life? I would love to know. 

Thursday's Reflection: Freedom

How do you plan to spend the 4th of July this year? Since this year the 4th is on a Friday, I imagine many will be celebrating the entire weekend with picnics, and attendance at fireworks and parades and maybe outdoor concerts featuring patriotic music. Along with participating in the fun and family times, enjoying good food and drink, and playing under both the sun and the stars, I hope you will lift a prayer for the gift of living in this country and for the ongoing efforts to fulfill the hopes and dreams of our founders. 

We are a nation still evolving, still discovering who we are and who we are meant to be, and because of the freedoms we have declared for ourselves, our differences sometimes seem more visible and stronger than our similarities. Sometimes that is painful,  and sometimes we forget we are a country that holds freedom as its utmost value. 

I like what the historian Barbara Tuchman said in an essay "On Our Birthday--America as Idea," 
       The United States is a nation consciously conceived, 
       not one that evolved slowly out of an ancient past. It
       was a planned idea of democracy, of liberty, of conscience,
       and pursuit of happiness. It was the promise of equality
       of opportunity and individual freedom within a just social
       order, as opposed to the restrictions and repressions of 
       the Old World.

No, we haven't lived up to our ideals, but our ongoing assumption is that we will continue to try. We will continue to bump against each other's version of the truth, and we will continue to have major growing pains, but that is almost the point. We know we are allowed to do that. We must do that. 

I just started reading a little book by Kent Nerburn called Calm Surrender, Walking the Path of Forgiveness. I didn't expect this book to make me think about life as an American, but I think as a nation we are not so good at forgiving ourselves for not living up to our own expectations. This is a huge simplification, I know, but we seem quite good at forgiving others. Think about the rebuilding of Germany, for example, after WWII. 

The first chapter in this book is called "More than I Had Hoped, Less Than I Had Dreamed," and while he is talking about our individual strengths and weaknesses, I think there is relevance for our lives as citizens, as these United States. 
       We will never be as good or worthy as we wish to be.
       We will be human --- too human --- and we will fall short
       of our hopes for ourselves over and over again. If we can
       forgive ourselves for our failures --- not seven times, but 
       seventy times seven --- we can forgive others for their
       failures. We know that we are all humans, struggling
       by the lights we have toward our vision of good…Though 
       I am not what I thought I should be, I am more than I
       might ever had hoped. As I survey the landscape of my 
       life, I am overcome with a sense of wonder.
                                                  pp 36-37  

Yes, I am overcome with a sense of wonder--and gratitude that we even have an Independence Day. On this precious holiday, I pray we each rejoice in not only what we have and who we are, but more in what we have yet to become. 

A Bonus
What would the 4th of July be without good food. Here's my version of strawberry shortcake, based on my Grandma Hansen's recipe. (I added the herbs or "green things," as my kids call them. 

Shortcake, with emphasis on CAKE
2 cups flour
4 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 butter
1/2 cup sugar
About 3/4 cup milk
Minced fresh herbs such as mint or lemon balm or lavender
1 well-beaten egg

Heat milk to a simmer. Remove from heat and stir in minced herbs. Cover and steep about 10 minutes. Uncover and let cool. When cool, add well-beaten egg. Add more milk to make 1 cup if needed.
Mix together dry ingredients and add liquid ingredients to the dry. 
Grease a 9x9 or 9x13 pan and bake at 450 degrees for 10-15 minutes.
Serve with fresh berries and whipped cream.

An Invitation
What relevance does the phrase "More Than I Had Hoped, Less Than I Had Dreamed" have for you personally and as a citizen? I would love to know.