raising a spiritually conscious child

I'm perpetually wondering about and wrestling with 

how to share the spiritual aspects of life with Little N.

no peeking...

We've tried a couple different churches, which he loathed and resisted, and even dharma school, which was a hit this summer, faded away as Little N started enjoying Sunday mornings at his dad's place.  How do I want and choose to tend my son's spirituality?  In the absence of a worship community, who can help me?

Growing up as an Evangelical Christian, my family did a lot to develop my Christian consciousness.  In addition to Sunday worship at church, there was attendance at a Christian elementary school for some years, weekly Pioneer Girls (think Christian Girl Scouts), and nightly Bible stories, prayer, and praise songs before bed.  As a teen, Pioneer Girls was replaced with Bible Study and Youth Group.  But always there was some group activity and relationships participating in my development.

As an adult, I've largely stepped away from Evangelical Christianity and adopted a more spiritual-but-not-religious approach to my faith, with pagan leanings.  This is rich and meaningful to me, but leaves me at a loss, I feel, for how to share a vibrant, lived spirituality with my son.  With no community with whom to share this good work, I'm seeking alternatives on my own.  To that end, I've ordered the following three books, in hopes for some cues and clues along the way:

I first saw Peaceful Piggy Meditation in a therapist's waiting room and wanted to steal it!  (I didn't.)  It offered such a simple clear way to start meditating with this totally non-threatening little pig.  Piggy makes it look easy, do-able even.  I've thought of the book several times since then and finally decided to purchase my own copy to share with Little N.

Sitting Still Like a Frog came up to view as I searched for the Piggy.  Written to parents, I'm optimistic that it can be one of my guides in teaching Little N mindfulness, that I hope will help him to manage and process the big emotions that seem to come with Autism.  Also, I need help with mindfulness.

Finally, The Earth Child's Handbook speaks to my pagan interests.  It offers crafts, recipes, coloring pages, inspiration and information that I can share with Little N about respecting and dwelling in the in the natural world.  I don't expect that everything in this book will speak to me, but I think it will give us enough material to play with spirit together.

A note on Christianity: I feel like I'm recovering from years in Evangelical Christian culture.  But that is not the same thing, to me, as the person, life, and message of the Christ.  In my spirituality there is plenty of room for meditation, mindfulness, and even pagan awareness in concert with Christ.  So while I (try to) remain open to Christianity, the packaging tends to turn me away from it, and makes it hard for me to find open, vibrant, true ways to share Christ with my son.  I will say, that Mima sent Little N a Christian book about kindness and he loves it.  We read it most nights.  It's offered us an excellent place to start.

Saturday morning

I'm still recovering from a vulnerability hangover here.

a little reminder (for me & for you) about the Power of Vulnerability:

I am sad… that Little N has Autism

We had an important meeting this week at Little N's school.  It was his Special Ed reevaluation and Individualized Education Plan meeting where the school psychologist and Little N's teacher and in-school therapists discuss his current scores on their examinations of him with us, his parents.  We also planned the goals for his next year of school.  It was an in-my-face discussion of all the places where Little N continues to fall behind peers his age.

I was anxious and preoccupied leading up to the meeting.  When we first received the notice for reevaluation I was nervous.  Little N was thriving in the Special Ed class, what if they wanted to pull him out of it! Then we received his report card.  Little N was scoring below average in most areas of the report.  What if he never got out of Special Ed?  What if he could never hold a job, make friends, offer compassion to someone… the fears and questions took over.

During the meeting, I took notes on all of Little N's challenges.  They are painful to me.  It's as if Autism gets in his way of being him.  But then I also try to be pro-Neurodiversity.  I try to acknowledge and accept and advocate that there are many ways of being, perceiving, and expressing oneself in the world.  We've got a smattering of typical, acceptable ways to be in society but kids like Little N reveal more of what's possible.  Autism doesn't necessarily get in the way of him being him; it's part of him being him and part of what he offers his family, classmates, teachers, future employers, and all the folks that come in contact with him.

I put a good face on it on Facebook.  And it was a good meeting.  Little N is a joy to work with.  Each one of the experts in the room repeated that in one form or another.  They enjoy working with him.  He's eager, playful, fun, retains what he's learned, makes excellent progress.  And... he scores below average on all of their tests.

I brought all of this to my much-loved therapist.  "I'm sad," I told her.  She murmured understanding.  Then she asked me, "How sad do you feel?"  I couldn't answer.  I need time to sit with myself and just feel all the emotions tangled up in my son's Autism.  She could have said, "It's not all about you."  But she didn't.  Because my feelings about my son's challenges are about me.  I'm allowed to feel sad sometimes, even as I get to be encouraging and curious and supportive a lot of the time.

I have some sense of where the sadness comes from.  My grief that the perfect, typical boy I thought I had is gone, along with all my unarticulated dreams and expectations for him.  My memory of the close relationship between grades and self esteem: A means I'm awesome, D means I'm dumb.  What could "below average" possibly mean in that matrix?   My fear of the world out there, of cliques and cruelty, where there is very little room for someone different.  My pervasive doubt that I can in any way equip him for that world and the challenges that await him there.

It was a good meeting.  Little N is a joy, to me and to his team.  He is making progress that all of us can see and celebrate.  Someday he will be mainstreamed into a general ed classroom.  I have reinforcements in the form of his team, and even those dreaded reports, to help me teach him the tools he needs for the days ahead.  All of this is true at the same time that my sadness is true.

self portrait Saturday: Mommy gets out!

geekalicious, right? 

I was just thinking that it's been ages since I've been to a play - and that getting out to artsy stuff was once a regular highlight of my nights.  Then our Beloved Miss A invited me to this:

10 Days to Happiness: One Woman's Hilariously Tortured Search for Enlightenment

The play itself was fairly predictable but getting out and doing something different was a real treat.  And our Beloved Miss A is always good company.

I've recognized, these days, that I'm angry and jealous that L gets to do what he wants he when he wants now that we're separated.  I'm the single mom and he's the renewed bachelor.  Which means more of my time is focused on parenting than on myself and my interests.  I'm not working out or developing my hobbies or getting out to artsy Seattle because I'm home with Little N.  So I arrange my outings for when Little N is with L or the beloved babysitter and I savor the experiences and relationships in the moments that I have.

It's not quantitatively fair.  But something qualitative is working for me.  I miss my boy when he's off with has dad, even though I simultaneously cherish the hours to clean the apartment, read, sit in front of  HULU, catch up on FB.   I show up and deeply value the time together with my friends for book group, or a supper date after work, or creating ritual.  The constraints on my time and attention is reinforcing the value of these moments of connection.  For that much, I can relax, experience some gratitude, and let my jealousy for L's new life fade, even a little bit, as I start to understand and embrace my new life.

self portrait Saturday: post-spa glow

I love to spa

 I feel relaxed and refreshed.  I very much enjoyed the good company of Ms. M.  I will do this again.

witching hour

every workday at 11am I'm jonesing for a cigarette

so today, again, I headed out to my stoop to compose myself over a cup of tea

it didn't work.

 between you, me & the butt can, I broke down had 1 cigarette

Which is to say, I'm addicted.  It tasted lousy but felt terrific.  My blood bubbled and sang within me. The world and my mood brightened.  I was ready to take on my job.  But this can't be true!  Such a bad habit gives such a good response.  I can't let this worst of my unhealthful habits resume.  

What I'm noticing:

A long time ago, I used to think that my body gave me good information and insights about myself, other people, spirit, my decisions...  I had a strong connection to my intuition and experienced that within my body.  But addictions of all sorts (including seemingly little things like sugar and nicotine) skew all that good information, twisting it into vibes and impulses that can't be trusted.  So here's another good reason to get clean of it all ~ I want to trust my body and the useful information that it can convey to me.  

Whole30 day9: grrrr

I really, really, really want a cigarette.

I'm frustrated, angry, and bored at my job and I want a break from this place and what we do here.  I want an occupation that matches my vocation (& I want some confidence as to what exactly that may be).  I want out of a sales environment.  I want in to something that engages my whole mind and my heart.  In the absence of smoking I want lollipops, M&Ms, gum...  Instead I'm grazing on pea pods.

What I'm noticing:

Yup, squelch those unruly thoughts and emotions with food.  Because there's no time or space right now to solve practical problems or dream new ways of living.  Nose to the grindstone, my time is not my own, let's see some productivity for these hours at the office.

What I'm doing:

I made a fresh cup of tea and headed out to my stoop by the butt can.  I gave myself a few moments to think my own thoughts and calm down.  One of the smoking clique members joined me and we chatted and laughed a little.  Somewhat restored, I came back in to my desk.

What's true:

Is that there are healthy and worse ways to experience emotions and thoughts, even big ones.  And I do get to choose what to do once I feel a particular feeling.  It's ok to feel it.  For me, it's good to feel it, even when it's uncomfortable.  And even in a place that feels unsupportive at times I can find my niche and nooks of security to pause for a few minutes and recognize the feelings.  Maybe jot them down to be wrangled with later.  But I can do this without hurting myself with food that does me only harm not health.  Because I want to live healthy both in regards to my feelings and to my food.

Whole30 Sunday brunch

I'm getting better at this!

Whole30 Friday night munchies

There's no "cheating" or "treats" on Whole30.  Ack!  What happened to Friday night pizza and beer?!

It's become fresh red raspberries.

Whole30 days 3&4

this is what I think a really good Whole30 plate looks like 

baked fish, kale sautéed in olive oil with peppers & onions, ton of steamed asparagus

and that was yesterday's lunch.  

I call this one "still life with sticker"

it's also some of today's snack food.  I actually really enjoy colored bell peppers as a snack.  

yes, they are more tasty with cheese...

creamy goodness for not awesome coffee.  

the coffee's bitter, I'm not.  (yes I am.)

do you see in this photo? - yes - more candy, lying in wait for me.

mine all mine!  except for this Whole30.

once upon a time (last week) I would have devoured more than my share of these tasty morsels.  

And my co-workers would either not notice or not mind.  

today the blessed things are lying around going stale.  

I'm noticing:

1) I eat without thinking about it.  Not right now, because of this Whole30, but usually.  I catch myself scraping the edge of the yogurt container, after dishing some out for Little N, and then lifting the spoon to my mouth until, Wait! Stop! Spit it out!  I'm on a Whole30!  Wow.  I didn't even notice I was about to eat something. The same goes for candy at the office.  Actually all food all the time.  I think, maybe, it's become the company I keep in these often lonely days at work and at home.

2) good glory I love and miss smoking. I physically crave it like I crave sweets. I bask in the secondhand smoke of the smoking clique at work.  

3) I love and miss the smoking clique.  We're all still friends but I don't have as much time with them to chat and gossip and vent and tease and just be together when I'm not smoking.  I've started slipping out to the butt can with a cup of tea to just hang out.  & get teased.  

self portrait Saturday: getting ready

This is the big pre-Whole30 weekend where I shop for fine protein and fresh produce.

And not much more than that. 

What I didn't expect, and actually really like, is this goal setting aspect to the program.  It expands the program beyond a simple (& tough!) diet to include more positive behaviors (my best habits) in more areas of my life.  It also should, maybe, give me places to focus besides on what I'm not eating and to look for positive changes due to what I am eating and choosing to do.

gratitude Sunday

I'm grateful for cultural changes that grant a little more acceptance and breathing room to divorce and alternative family structures (at least where we live in Seattle).

This afternoon, L showed up to have some time with Little N.  They're off to the beach on this cool overcast day.  I'm home puttering around, putting the place in order for a new week, thinking my own thoughts (rather than caregiving & disciplining thoughts).

For me, right now, time with L is kind of stressful.  We're not together anymore because we don't really dig being together.  But I do it, like yesterday's site seeing trip, for Little N's sake.  Is it really in his best interest I wonder?  One more question to navigate as we step deeper into new routines and patterns of relating.

I'm grateful to be able to dissolve a mismatched marriage.  I'm grateful for a former partner who is committed to his son and seeks involvement in his young life.  I'm grateful for the time, the support and encouragement of friends, the love of our son, to figure this all out a step at a time.

on the cusp

I am a number of things that a (nice, good, attractive...) woman is not supposed to be.

I am: fat, greying, short haired, divorcing, single mom, spiritual seeker, mentally ill.

Tomorrow, I turn 39.  I am aging. 

I am surprised at my own surprise when I tell you it's all ok. Some part of me still believes the old rules about what a woman should and shouldn't be or do.  But nothing bad is happening as a result or in connection with any of those qualities I currently inhabit. They are things that I've chosen and I live well in these choices. Entering my fortieth year, I am making some more choices about what to continue and what to change.  I'm happy to pause a minute and notice where I am today.  Happy and ok.

self portrait Saturday: out & about

Mommy got out today!

L watched Little N all afternoon so that I could have some time do whatever I wanted.  At first I planned to go to a movie.  But then I remembered that this was the first day of Tibet Fest 2013.  One of the Dharma School teachers had told me about it as the monastery is for Tibetan Buddhists. Curious, and settled on the fact that movies happen every weekend, I decided to go check it out.

At first I was kind of underwhelmed.  Tibet Fest was just a bunch of booths with same stuff that gets sold at every kind of Fest.  Silver jewelry.  Woven bags.  Flowy skirts.  But I took second look with the intention to learn something.  What was truly Tibetan about Tibet Fest?

The main stage is where all the action was. Tibetan folks and their friends watched the singers and dancers in traditional dress and playing traditional instruments.  A couple little children danced at the back of the audience.  To the left of the stage I found the booth for the Tibetan Association of Washington, where they had a couple of booklets about Tibet and a program for Tibet Fest.

In the mix of booths, I also found one raising support for the Tibetan Buddhist nuns (Tibetan Nuns Project) and another selling books for children.  Upstairs there was a room showing Tibetan films, mainly documentaries.  On my way out I passed a stand selling Tibetan drinks and cookies, so I bought a cookie for the trip home.

Overall a good outing for a mommy who rarely gets to explore her world, never mind the world at large, on her own these days.

commonplace: expansion

"Immature petition tries to convince God to remake the world in our image for our convenience, but mature petition asks God to remake us in God's own image, so that we can expand our capacity to respond to the world as it is."  p.105

"By crying help, we choose expansion rather than contraction, advance rather than retreat."  p. 108

"But you don't criticize, condemn, chide, or reject yourself.  Rather, you join God in God's desire for your own expansion and well-being."  p. 112

My small group at Woodland Park United Methodist Church (WPUMC) is still reading Brian McLaren's Naked Spirituality: a Life With God in 12 Simple Words.  I first wrote about it here.  Our most recent chapters were about the word, or prayer, help.   

I'm not much of a pray-er in terms of bringing petitions to God for intercession or some kind of result.  I grew up with a terminally ill father and a terminally ill aunt, both of whom I was close with.  I learned that the people we love suffer and die.  Prayer does not interrupt or otherwise alleviate that.  So for me, prayer at its best has come to mean more about good company with God while we live, survive, endure, make the best of... the life that is.  

But the idea of expansion brought a new facet of prayer to light.  That prayer might expand my consciousness, for example - expand (and deepen?) my understanding of what Little N needs right now.  So a few nights ago I prayed "help, help me with Little N in all of this," and then I went to bed.  I rested with a calmness about Little N that contrasted with the anxiety and fear that I'd brought to my prayer.  When I woke, I had new clarity about some changes that I could make in my attention and behavior that would better support my son.  I'd say I was expanded.  It didn't take away or in any way reduce the challenges before us, but I was better equipped and aware of how to engage and follow through in healthy ways for our family.  And the responsibility to engage and follow through was on me.  I was granted new insights and the choice to respond to them.

Another place I'm perceiving expansion is with our small group at WPUMC.  During the years of choosing and living in my marriage I also chose to let some of my values (peace, social justice, feminism at its best, spirituality etc.) drop away.  I was mostly aware of it; I deemed them unrealistic and unlivable for ordinary folks.  Though in some ways I assumed these values were still around, paused perhaps, latent, but that we, as a couple, would resume them.  It's become evident, now, that these are my values and not my husband's.  In small group I see and hear these values made central and significant in our conversations.  Ordinary people, not front line activists or otherwise public figures, who make a point to talk about these values and to work together to live them.  They model these values for me and when I go to group open to receiving help I am expanded by their example.

I believe that this expansion is what God wants for me, and for all us ordinary folks.  To live open, deep, expansive lives in our families and communities.  That, I guess, is where social change (peace, social justice, feminism at its best, spirituality, etc.) becomes the common sense of a culture and gradually ousts meaner, stingier world views (not that it worked in my marriage, hmmm).  And I love that McLaren makes the point that we don't cut ourselves down for being small or contracted in some way.  We love ourselves with God, we cultivate richness in our lives, together with God.  And I'd add, we extend that same gentle tending of love to others.  

gratitude Sunday

For all the kindness and concern that I have received in the last few days of deciding and sharing the decision.  Facebook is kind of an odd medium for personal news but it spared me an exhaustion of phone calls and questions.  For the relief of no secrets, of openness, of new beginnings.   

commonplace Wednesday: Womanspirit Rising

Originally published in 1979, Womanspirit Rising: A Feminist Reader in Religion, is a new classic on my summer reading list.  It's a collection of early essays by some of the most recognized writers in feminism and spirituality including: Merlin Stone, Starhawk, Rosemary Radford Reuther, Elisabeth Schussler Fiorenza, Mary Daly, and Zsuzsanna E. Budapest.  I'm about 25 pages into it and feel energized by the ideas, and reconnected with the feminist identity and theological interests of my college years.  But I'm a little puzzled too - how can I be part of this movement, this bigger conversation, these changes, as a mom with a job?  [When I was in college I was convinced that if the values and ideas I was engaging weren't accessible and actionable by "ordinary people" (rather than ivory tower PhD types) then they were useless.  I inadvertently made that my mission and fumbled my way into ordinariness.  Here I am and what to do, how to do it, with these big ideas?]

This quote from the Introduction offers some hints:

If the world has been named by Adam without Eve's consultation, then the world has been named from the male point of view.  As women begin to name the world for themselves, they will upset the order that has been taken for granted throughout history.  They will call themselves and the world into new being.  Naming women's experience thus becomes the model not only for personal liberation and growth, but for a feminist transformation of culture and religion.  "What would happen if one woman told the truth about her life?" asks poet Muriel Rukeyser. "The world would split open." p.7.

When women describe their experience they have the potential to change culture and to change religion.  I don't have complete understanding of this yet but I think it's something about the man-made constructs falling away, the rules and the givens, the masculine common sense is revealed for its incompleteness, inconsistency, and inaccuracy.  It is not whole and complete for human experience.  It is not a valid placeholder or assumption.  This falling away makes room for more understanding, more dimensions and perspectives can occupy the space held as truth.

One of my favorite ideas from Carry On, Warrior was G's approach to scripture.  She is totally up front about the fact that all Bible readers pick and choose what to obey and how to understand the Bible. When faced with a passage that she didn't understand she interpreted it against the primary rules to love God and love others.  Based on this she decides what to do with the puzzling verses.  All the other rules, and what I call the man-made constructs, get cast aside to make way for the real work of loving.   Some of her readers find this sacrilegious or blasphemous.  I call it a hermeneutic of love and I dig it.

At it's best, at my best, feminism is an angle for speaking back to the dominant culture and taking apart the givens and the rules.  It's not necessarily about male versus female, men vs. women.  Women just happen to have a particular opportunity to initiate these changes since they weren't welcome to participate in the original naming.  (But women aren't the only "other" that was left out.  There are lots of opportunities.)  And the way this happens, in part, is women talking about their lives - like G in Carry On, Warrior, like me on my blog and Facebook and in life.  It's tiny.  It's barely visible, one woman at a time.  It's sometimes exhausting and seemingly pointless.  But as I, and we, persist in lifting up our very personal lives for public view and value, we participate in a political process of making room for more, different, other than the man-made norms.  The world is "split open" and we have the opportunity to reorder and remake with a new measure - a measure of love.

self portrait Saturday: I'll show you mine

I got a bathing suit.  And I wore it out.  At the beach. Today.

One of my goals for this year was to wear my swimsuit out in public.  The plan was for that suit to be the bikini I got when I lost all the weight after having Little N.  I still have the bikini.  I also have all the weight, again.  And maybe it's my meds or maybe it's my lifestyle but the weight is not coming off so readily this time around despite the changes in diet, the new control over my binges, and the jogging.  So, do I hide under a bushel all summer long?  Draped in billowy T-shirts and black capris?  Or do I find a suit that fits, that I can move around in, and that I like?

I felt downright called to get a suit.  I found it at the store next door and it was on sale!  I am not going to be that mom fretting about her weight in front of her kid.  I am going to be with my kid, out in the world, doing stuff.  Like wading in the waves and digging in the sand.  And for that kind of stuff, I need a swimsuit.  

I still get judgey about weight and body issues - otherwise this post wouldn't feel worth writing about, right?  I compare myself to the other women along the seashore.  Bigger than her.  Smaller than her.  I almost grieve the loss of my younger thinner self.  But back then, I thought I was fat.  I didn't dare wear a bathing suit.  I was too self consciously fixated on the so-called perfect body that I didn't have to be able enjoy the body that I did have in the real world that I was living in.  That worry, that conviction, that my body wasn't quite right placed some activities and experiences out of my reach.  It restrained me.

So today I pulled on my swim tank and my swim shorts and, before loading up the car with the beach bag and the kiddo, I snapped a photo of my imperfect body in my comfy new suit ready for a morning of summer fun with my son.  

This is me. In the body I inhabit today.  The place from which I engage the world.  

commonplacing: TAZ

In my small group at WPUMC we're reading Brian McLaren's Naked Spirituality: A Life WIth God In 12 Simple Words.  It introduced me to the concept of a Temporary Autonomous Zone (TAZ).

"...rigid conformity and emotional inhibition stultify the human spirit, and so occasionally people defy the authorities and dare to dance.  They create what author Kester Brewin describes as Temporary Autonomous Zones (TAZs), places where the normal patterns of hegemony and homogeneity are broken."

This is taken from page 65, quoting Barbara Ehrenreich, and citing examples like Woodstock, Burning Man, Mardi Gras.  These events, at their best are about jubilation, freedom, and connection.  He continues on page 67.

"Could it be that the kingdom of God is the ultimate TAZ, the ultimate liberation from the normal oppressive patterns of hegemony and homogeneity."

When I was single and child free it was a lot easier for me to resent and resist hegemony and homogeneity.  Certainly they were always there, but I did feel freer to choose people, interests, and expression that were outside the norm.  I didn't dream of marriage, family, and home ownership.  I dreamt of living purposefully, finding a way to make a difference, to be my own, and to be different.

That desire was part of why I chose the graduate school and program that I did.  Whole Systems Design (WSD) at an alternative university.  My dream took the shape of wanting to write, specifically articles about good news, and then maybe start my own program focused on that kind of story.  Producing the stories.  Training people to seek, articulate, and promote good news.  But WSD didn't work that way for me.  It focused on talking and small groups.  Not my areas of professional interest.  Worse, to me, it didn't help equip me to navigate or talk back to the "real world" of hegemony and homogeneity.  I graduated more adrift and vulnerable than I started.

Reentering the "real world" I married my grad school honey, started an interim job, and suddenly fell pregnant.  Six years later I'm still at the job working as the sole provider for my little family.  I feel trapped in the hegemony and homogeneity of job, home, and child rearing.  Any little gap for autonomy is savored, celebrated, and jealously guarded.

These days I find my Temporary Autonomous Zones in my small groups (ironically enough given the grad school debacle), both the Christian group and the Pagan group.  Granted, we are not dismantling patriarchy or otherwise disrupting the status quo in publicly recognizable ways.  But we are peeling away our conformity and inhibition to unveil to ourselves and these trusted friends our thoughts, feelings, and private realities.  And in Pagan ritual we even "dare to dance."

Today it is easy for me to accept grace as the thing that pierces hegemony and homogeneity and frees us to be authentic souls liberated from the rules that stultify human life.  This definition holds true to the example of Jesus's life - practicing a life of loving others that put him outside the rules and mores of the law and the culture of his time.  He stands as the model of how Christians too ought to live lives of love, lives changed by that grace.  I experience this kind of grace in the Pagan rituals as we minister to each other in ceremony, raise energy together, and "party like Pagans."

But it's challenging me and yet I'm hungry for it, to have this grace in the rest of my life in the "real world."  (I guess that's why they're "temporary" autonomous zones.)  How do I live a daily life of such grace, outside the bounds of hegemony and homogeneity?  Is it just part of being fully human that we develop and abide by these conventions?  To live in this world, a soul and a body, means we entangle ourselves in these invisible, powerful things.  And it's a life of spirituality, of practice and of hunger, that manifests the desire for grace and the means to be grace to ourselves and others.

welcome mat

This is me two years ago, when yoga and a healthy diet were a normal part of my life.

Today I'm a good 25 lbs plumper than this photo.  I can still reach my toes but... yeah, things are different.  I'm posting this photo as a welcoming back to my yoga practice and a motivation to get vigilant about my diet.  Because I miss the combination of calm and energy that my yoga practice renders.  And I would love to live in that lean, limber body again.