Standing Firm with Arms Stretched Out

First it is necessary to stand on your own two feet. But the minute a man finds himself in that position, the next thing he should do is reach out his arms. ~ Kristin Hunter

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Today I am seeing, full force, how communicating with others about what's happening in my life offers them the space to make a contribution and expand upon what I am open to seeing.

I'd like to share two examples:

The Bee

Of course, creating butterflies means getting stung...and that's exactly what happened yesterday. A bee got under my sandal and the stinger went into my toe!

I felt a sharp pain up my leg and sat down to examine it as tears came out of my eyes. I was scared and wasn't sure what to do as I'd never been stung before. Before reaching out to anyone I took the stinger out myself and was quite aware that the pain continued. I got up, and proceeded to hobble home. In doing so, I had no idea what I would do with my toe after I got there. In that moment I had a choice: do this on my own (internet search) or ask for help.

So, I called my mom and she advised me to be with a friend so that if I had any sort of reaction that I'd be safe. I would have never thought of that myself, so I took her advice and called a friend. He lived a block away from where I was and was quite helpful! I even learned a few things about allergic reactions and bee stings because his father (who is a doctor) was over to visit.


Class Enrollment

I'm teaching a free class about understanding and tracking the monthly female cycle to young women and their moms staring in late July through August (if you're in San Diego and would like more information please email me).

I would love to create an intimate space to do this and that, to me, means having a safe community around the class. At this time I only have 2 moms & daughters enrolled and I would like to have at least 1 or more teams involved to run the class. However, I was really nervous about advertising to the general community because I want to be selective about who is in the class since some of the information could be viewed as controversial ("it's a sex class!"...which it's not)

I was speaking with my charter school colleague today and mentioned the class to her and asked if she could put out the word for me to her friends. She mentioned putting it on a San Diego yahoo list and I got very reactive about not wanting the "wrong" people in the class.

She then offered a great idea: to enroll in the class, individuals need to have a conversation with me about the class before signing up to ensure that everyone has the same vision.

Before having this conversation with my colleague, I was seriously thinking of canceling the class because I couldn't see a way to expand my network.

So, today's homework: reach out listening for contribution, even when you think that you don't need to, you'll be surprised at the results. Feel free to share your work here, I'd love to hear about it!