The Pepper Principle

Hey, all you FFGs and Future FFGS!

First, a word from our sponsors:

I just put a little note on the home page about my appearance on Samantha Heller's Sirius Radio show on Doctor Radio tomorrow (Friday!) from 1-2 EST. If you have a Sirius subscription and want to hear me blather on ... please listen in! Also, you'll be able to call in and/or email questions. The phone # (NOT A TOLL-FREE, SO USE YOUR UNLIMITED MINUTES!) is 1-877-698-3627; email is docs@sirius-radio.com.

Just kidding ... I don't have any sponsors. Unfortunately. If I had sponsors, maybe I could just blog all day and not have to actually work ... because this is not really work for me. Too much fun to be work.

Anyway ... I have been working lately on something I call "The Pepper Principle." As you faithful blog readers know, I have been in major transition for a while now ... and as you may not know, I haven't been handling it very well. One of the reasons I have been so absent from the blog is that I've given in to that old perfectionist's flaw ... the whole thing about hiding when you're not at your best. I can't be the perfect friend, perfect employee, perfect blogger? Well, then, I'm just going to disappear. Not sure if this is just something I do or if you guys can relate. But there it is.

I have been worried about EVERYTHING. Questioning EVERYTHING. What if it wasn't right to move my family to Nashville? What if my magazine isn't everything I want it to be (or at least doesn't suck?)? What if my husband isn't happy here? What if my son hates his new school? What if my dog misses her back yard? What if Michael Phelps doesn't win gold tonight?

This isn't typical of me, really. I have moved several times in my life, but never with a family. I guess I feel like the stakes have never been higher, and that's made me even more likely to obsess about everything.

But I have been working to quiet my mind, quiet those doubts and questions that are keeping me up at night and threatening to make this time ... what should be the best time of my life ... miserable.

You know that whole thing about being "in the moment"? I have never really understood how to get there or even what that means, until lately. But I was reading a book by my friend Ali Domar, "How to be Happy Without Being Perfect," and came across this little thing about of all things, a dog. She makes the point that dogs are the perfect (! there's that word) example of being in the moment. They don't worry about what they're having for dinner, whether they're going to get to work out today, how they might have screwed up a conversation yesterday. No. They are just sitting there, taking in life, their little eyes sucking up the scene in front of them.

I thought that was interesting. And then a couple of days later, I looked at my cute little Pepper (check out her mug, above), sitting on a chair in our APARTMENT, just staring out into space. And I actually said out loud, "I wonder what she's thinking." and then I realized: SHE IS NOT THINKING ABOUT ANYTHING. There is no running commentary in her head. She's not running down the list of what she should be doing today, tonight, tomorrow, yesterday, next month, last year. She is just sitting. Waiting for the next thing. Not judging every moment as good, bad, and spinning out to the next.

And I thought, I want to be like that. I want to stop letting my expectations of this life get in the way of actually living.

That, my FFG friends, is the Pepper Principle. Whenever I start spinning, ruminating, worst-case-scenarioing, I think about Pepper's eyes. That kind of blank stare behind which there's no complicated set of machinery, twisting and turning forward and behind in time. And it's really been helping me, I have to say. Helping me move on when I screw up. Helping me not to lie awake, thinking of all the to-dos.

Anyway ... I would love to hear if you connect with this at all, or if it's just me. And if it's just me, well ... that's ok.

Thanks for reading!

Lisa D

Hi from the Land of I Don't Know!

I apologize for my unexplained absences, my impromptu hiatus, my complete and utter disappearing act for the last several months (I can't bear to look at the date of my last post for fear I will drown in the waves of guilt that I'm just barely surfing on right now). Anyway ... I want to hear all about what's up with you. But I will start with what's up with me ... as usual ... and hope that the one or two of you still out there will drop me a comment.

To keep from going on and on, I'm going to do this in a list.

The Top 10 Things I Did (and Did Not Do) on My Summer Vacation

1. I did not have a summer vacation.
2. I uprooted my family and moved them ... with the bare minimum possessions (flat-screen TV, running shoes, assorted Transformers and various other pieces of molded plastic that pass for toys for Johnny, an IPod shuffle loaded with my husband's favorite Johnny Cash tunes) ... into an APARTMENT in Nashville. I have not lived in an apartment in 25 years. Nothing against apartments, but I feel like I'm in an alternate universe.
3. I did not sell my house in Birmingham (yet), a major source of consternation.
4. I rediscovered how much I love cycling thanks to the parks and the Natchez Trace near my APARTMENT.
5. I put out the first issue ... a sneak preview mini version ... of my new magazine, Spry. And I am in the process, right now, of putting out the REAL first issue, which will be published the second week of September.
6. I realized that all that fear I've been working so hard to banish--that self-doubt, that perfectionism, that all-or-nothing thinking--was just waiting here, under the surface, for the smallest opening to emerge. And that it has the potential of undoing this dream ... the dream of having my own magazine, of making the most of a platform where I can spread the message of positive, inspirational healthy living to 9 million people (!). BUT ONLY IF I LET IT.
7. I got lost going to and from work almost every day for three weeks after I moved to Nashville. (And still do, some days.)
8. I re-experienced the power of It's Not an Option. As in ... INO to give up and go home, to Bham. INO to let my perfectionism close my mind to input and criticism. INO to not speak my mind when I need to, seek clarity when things are fuzzy, push the issue, ask questions, risk looking like the fool or the bitch or the trouble-maker.
9. I reconnected with my husband. This move has not been easy, no, but it is bringing us together in a way that we really needed. We're talking more than ever, cooperating more than ever. We're more of a team than we have been in a long time.
10. I figured out how important friends are in my life ... my "running friends" in Birmingham, in particular. I miss my little group so much ... even though I was barely coherent during our 5 a.m. runs, they were always there for me, a great sounding board. I am not the easiest person to get close to ... I am always holding a piece of myself back--a bigger piece with some people than with others. So it is not easy for me to replace friends. All I can do now is be myself, let my true self shine, with all of its flaws and imperfections, and see what (and who) that brings to me.

So ... that's what's up with me. The short version, anyway.

I do want you to know that I am launching Spryliving.com, a companion site to Spry magazine. It is up and running in betaish form right now. I would LOVE it if my FFG friends would follow me there. One of the things I'm trying to do with Spry is help people achieve good health for a good life--health, as you all surely know, is not an end in itself. It's what allows us to reach for what we really want in life--it's the platform from which we can spring forward, take a leap of faith, and chase the dreams that we've always had inside.

On the site, we're launching something called the Dream It, Do It Diary. Here's the idea: You sign up, and choose a dream: have you always wanted to play guitar? Do ballet? Take a trip to the Andes? Walk a 5K? Lose a bit of weight? Anyway, choose from the menu of dream categories, and you'll have your own little diary on the site. You'll be able to update daily (if not more often) and get comments from others who share your dream.

I'm counting on you guys to make the Dream It Do It Diary break all kinds of traffic records!

I promise I will post soon ... see you on Spryliving.com.

Lisa D