In pursuit of life, love and my authentic self.

I was reminded this week by Jason how powerful our early childhood memories are and how they affect our lives even as adults. I had an idyllic childhood until around the age of 10 when my Mother’s alcoholism began to impact our family. As I was the baby of the family I was less impacted than my older Sister. I really have no memories until I was around the age of four or five. My first memory is of being yelled at by my Dad for watering the bushes. In those days wine and sherry came in these big dark bottles and I had found some in the garage. I didn’t know what was in them and it looked like water to me so I did what I thought was a good deed. The only catch is that what was in those bottles was kerosene! Nothing ever grew in that garden again. When I think back now that was pretty dangerous to leave kerosene where a four year old could have drunk it instead. They didn’t worry about things like this in the late 50’s, early 60’s.

Another early childhood memory was being abandoned at the Montreal Airport Hilton. My Father’s construction company built it and it was a favorite haunt of my parents. One evening we all went there for dinner and afterwards my parents met up with a friend of theirs and disappeared. As it turns out he was breaking up with his wife and required some advice. We were left in the lobby to wait for what seemed an eternity and I can remember being frightened that they weren’t coming back to get us. My Sister kept reassuring me that everything was fine but I remember I was very happy to see them and mad that them at the same time.

Most of my earliest memories are of Christmas mornings because they were magical. I believed in Santa until at least 12 and I kind of still believe. I also remember when I was in Grade 3 and one of the neighborhood boys would not allow me to come home at lunch, blocked my way and threaten to beat me up. I was really scared and intimidated. His family lived across the street, a family of three boys. When my Mum found out she marched over there and tore a strip off of Mrs. Fraser. The harassment ceased immediately. Maybe that’s where I learned to be Rambo Mom.

So if I learned anything from these memories it is not to water your bushes with kerosene, don’t leave your children alone in hotel lobbies, believe in Santa forever and stand up for your children.

Not so bad. What did your early childhood memories teach you?

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Have you ever had to make a decision and found yourself weighing the pros and cons?  Should you break up with your boyfriend or buy that house?  I can remember making lists to try and make the best decision. The truth is you already know what to do.  Somewhere in the core of your being you know what you want to do.  The problem is your head.

People want to make rational decisions based on facts and that’s all fine and dandy if we were rational beings but we are not.  We love people who are bad for us.  We eat, drink and smoke too much.  If we were so rational we wouldn’t engage in all these self destructive behaviors.  So let’s agree for the most part we are not rational.

I was speaking today with someone who has to make a decision on which company she wants to work for and I told her she already knows what she wants to do; now she has to rationalize it so her brain can accept it.

I remember back in the 80’s when I desperately wanted to have a third child, my husband and I agonized over whether we could afford to expand our family.  It was honestly heart wrenching because we took our parental responsibility very seriously.  We ended by deciding to indulge in another child when he got promoted.  We should have just gone for it.

Have you ever experienced what I refer to as my “spidey sense”? You find yourself feeling uncomfortable when you meet someone new.  There is just something wrong with the person.  I think we all experience this feeling.  The opposite is also true, that you feel comfortable and connected to someone almost immediately.

There has been some interesting research done on intuition and how powerful it can be.  There are endless examples where people have been saved from disaster by following their intuition. There are as many examples of people reporting afterward that they had a bad “feeling” and didn’t listen to it. Sometimes I do ignore it but in retrospect I did have a feeling about what was about to happen.  I have to learn to be more sensitive to it earlier.

So next time you have a decision to make, listen to your inner voice, your gut feeling because it has something to say to you.  Are you ready to listen?  I would appreciate if you would share with me stories of when your intuition played a part in your life.

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I guess we all receive e-mails with inspiring messages.  At least we women get quite a few of these.  My friends know not to send me e-mails that have to be forwarded and if they do that by mistake I take the forwarding part off.  I think we can all decide for ourselves whether we need to share things.  I really don’t like to be threatened with going to hell or destroying a child because I fail to send things along.  Our company actually had a policy against chain letters which I totally support.  Plus it’s kind of creepy. Oh my God I have twenty seconds to send this to 12 of my best girlfriends…

One of these e-mails I received is kind of cool.  It included many uplifting and truthful nuggets of wisdom.  My friend who sent it to me asked which one I related to and she guessed perfectly.  Here it is:

“No matter how you feel, get up, get dressed and show up.”

That my basic philosophy.  Many a morning I would love to roll over and go back to sleep even though I love my job.  Perhaps it’s the basic wish for freedom to do what we want.  Freedom can be vastly overrated.  There is a song that says, “Freedom means nothing left to lose”.  If you’re totally free, you have no attachments and I wouldn’t like that.  I am attached to everything, my job, my employees, my friends and ultimately my family.

So I get up, get dressed and show up.  People are given the impression that they have enjoy everything they do and that’s nonsense. There are no jobs or relationships that don’t include some crap or at least some boredom.  If everything was exciting, how would be able to tell the difference.  It’s like being happy.  If you were always happy then being happy wouldn’t be special.  I guess that why when people are super rich and can have every material thing they want, it’s no fun anymore because it’s not special.

The truth is most people don’t care how you feel.  You can stop taking yourself so seriously because nobody else does.

Plus if you don’t show up you may miss a terrific opportunity. Open your heart and your mind, be present in your own life.

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This week I ventured to the capital of the United States, Washington DC.  I took a flight from Montreal to Dulles International on a Regional Jet.  Since I was an employee of an airline for 20 years, I have experienced my share of turbulence over the years but never like this.  About halfway through the flight we started to experience serious turbulence.  People were hanging on for dear life and as this was happening I was thinking about all the people who have died in aircraft accidents over the years, not the least of which the 9/11 victims.  Also I was alone with no one to share my fear so my imagination could go to the extreme limits of the situation.  I was also thinking I really hadn’t wanted to make the trip.  Had I ignored my own intuition?

As we were being jockeyed around I was thinking about my family and my friends and that if we did crash that I hoped the end would come quickly and that it would not be painful or at least not for long. But more than that I was thinking I was not ready, although I’ve fulfilled my responsibilities as a Mother, I want more time. I want more time to spend with my husband, boys, grandchildren, dogs and friends.  (the order is not a mistake, I really love my dogs and it depends on the friend).  I would imagine that patients faced with a terminal illness diagnosis feel the same.  They want more time.  Some think why me?  But in reality, why not you?  Some people believe if they eat right, exercise, go to Church; take care of their families bad things shouldn’t happen to them.  I can attest to this that they do anyway.  Shit happens. We all know that bad things happen to good people and that nothing happens to some very bad people.  Then there are those who believe everything happens for a reason and I think this is a way for people to feel that some entity in some form is in control instead of accepting the randomness of the universe.  I think it makes them feel better and if so, good for you!  I actually hope you’re right.

I’ve worked very hard all of my adult life and certainly no one should feel sorry for me because I am blessed.  I would like to be able to take things a little easier, reduce the stress and smell the roses more often.  As you can imagine I was very glad to get home to my little life grateful that I have some more time….

My husband’s family believe that when your name is “at the top of the list”, that’s it, you’re a goner.

Do you believe in fate and destiny?  Or do you leave it all in God’s hands to control?

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Accepting that I may have no friends after I finish this blog, I must in the spirit of fairness provide the other side of the story. Actually it was one of my readers (Curly Q) who convinced me to attempt to see the problems from the other side and expose how we got here.  I must also confess I have received input from some Gen X and Y’s in order to make this as complete as I can.

Let’s start at the beginning and keep in mind that Baby Boomers cover a huge chunk of people, anyone born from 1945 to 1964.  That’s twenty years.  In some cases the Mother and child are both Baby Boomers but I can assure you someone born in 1945 does not think anything like someone born in 1963.

Regardless society has gone through tremendous changes and I will keep to those that have impacted the “child”.  When I was growing up only poor people lived in apartments, we felt sorry for any kids whose Mother worked, and a man whose wife had to work was considered to be a failure.

Fast forward to today.  Both parents work, the Mother probably makes more than the Father, the children are in daycare or if you are wealthy with a Nanny by age one year or in the US - three months.  Being a stay at home Mother is not valued and takes a strong character to do this with the pressure to be a CEO before you’re 40.  After your minimum 10 hour day you are definitely not equipped to discipline your child so you let things go just to get by.  Plus you feel guilty for leaving them all day and you want your time together to be pleasant.

Seventy percent of the marriages will fail which will cause huge grief and upset for the children, never mind the ones who are still living in “broken homes”.   Then there will be the competition between the ex’s to be the most popular parents and here it comes again, the GUILT.   I think Mothers feel the guilt more than the Fathers in general; it seems to be a hard coded trait.

Were we better off being brought up by our Mothers at home?  People had less but there was more time for family.  Women on the hand were second class citizens. Husbands made the decisions because they made the money.   Have we exchanged the equality of women at the expense of the well-being of our children?  I know I will be crucified for saying this, but to a point I will have to say yes.  I stayed home for 12 years and I don’t regret it.   There is no question this hurt my career and affected my personal finances after the divorce but this was the price I had to pay.

My readers have also spoken of money being power and it is in any relationship.  Baby Boomers are very good at manipulating their children of all ages with money.  They give it but it has strings.  Nothing is “free” in this world.  Keep that in mind and if you choose to accept it, you choose to accept the strings so don’t whine about it.  If you want to be independent, stop taking the money.  Simple eh?

Bottom line - should we be surprised that our children don’t want to grow up to be like us.  To have sacrificed so much for the all mighty buck and our suburban life styles.  We spoiled them and we, encouraged them to feel entitled and made a fuss every time they did the smallest positive thing.  No wonder they are ill equipped. They didn’t have to work for what they got.  If you feed a dog filet mignon every day and then try and give him dog food, he won’t eat it.  Eventually however when he gets hungry enough, he’ll eat it.

My children are all Gen X and Y - they are good, socially-conscious hard-working people and many of my children’s friends are also.  Let’s hope these new leaders find a way to balance between what they need and what they want.

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I‘ve been watching the program “Til debt do us part“, the series on TV where couples apply to get a money makeover from Gail Vaz-Oxlade.  It is incredible to me how seemingly intelligent people can be so incredibly stupid about money.   It’s really quite simple.  If you make $4000 net a month and you spend $6000 a month, remarkably you will be in debt for $2000 a month.  If you do this for 12 months, you’ll be $24K in the hole.  Why this is so complicated to people is the topic of this week’s blog.  You eat what you kill.  In caveman days if you didn’t go out to hunt, you didn’t eat and you didn’t survive. It was that simple.  Life is a little more complex now but if you have a job that pays minimum wage, you will never be able to afford a house, car, vacations and plasma TV’s.  Nevertheless this same person often believes they are somehow “entitled” to live with the same lifestyle their parents had.

Unfortunately the credit card companies, banks and the big box stores are more than happy to advance you money you haven’t earned.  People are so shocked that the “buy now pay later” scam where if you don’t pay when you are supposed to the 30% interest is retroactive to the day you got the merchandise.   At 30% interest per year, a $1500 TV paid over 3 years will cost you $1360 in interest alone for a total of $2860.  Does it still sound like a good deal?  People don’t want to wait to save up and buy it.  They want it right now, everything now!

I have a friend who laments against the evils of the workaday life but let me ask a question.  Will your children get braces if they need them?  Will they be supported to go to higher education or will they be saddled with loans well into adulthood?  Will they have a yard to play in?  All these things take money.  The generation X and Y are disgusted by what they saw their parents go through to support their families - and with good reason. With companies laying people off, recession taking a big bite out of retirement savings and companies closing resulting in the loss of pensions they worked all their lives for.  It is normal that they would look at this and say, “No way. Not for me!”.  That’s fine but they don’t have an alternative to get all that cool stuff they want. They just know they don’t want to work like their parents did.  Meanwhile they want to be able to go out to restaurants, take a taxi because public transit is such a drag, have designer clothes and go on holidays they finance on credit cards - not to mention all the electronic goodies like plasma TV’s, cell phones, computers, video games and stereos.

I remember when my generation was in university and so many majored in teaching. When they came out there were no jobs.  Imagine working for 4 years and having to work at McDonalds.  That’s because they didn’t do their research to know that it would be years before there were sufficient retirements to accommodate new teachers.  It’s supply and demand.  You need to find something that interests you and something an organization will be willing to pay you for.

Please don’t think that I want people to work at jobs that they hate because can be soul-destroying, but you have to be practical.  Decide what is important to you. What lifestyle fits your dreams?  Do you want a house, kids and a car?  If these things are not important, it will be much easier for you to reach your financial goals.  My middle son wants none of those things so his requirements are easily fulfilled. But if you do; you’ll need to think ahead about how you’re going to get there and let me tell you it’s going to take sacrifice and a lot of work.

If generation X and Y don’t want to go down the corporate highway that’s fine with me but they will have to reduce their expectations.  Did you know that 58% of baby boomers are still partially or completely supporting their adult children?  What I find is that people of this generation want to be paid to pursue their hobbies.  Guess what folks; hobbies are for after work and the weekends.  For those who can make their hobbies become a sustainable means of income, that’s fabulous; more power to you.  For the rest of you, grow up get a job.  And if you want a better job, go back to school at night and get the skills you need to get a better job. One area we baby boomers failed miserably was to prepare our children for the rigors of adult life, me included.

It would be nice if you would take a moment to thank your parents for what they sacrificed to provide for you if indeed they did.  It will make them feel better because they will probably have to work into their 80’s.

P.S. besides…  we need you to be financially secure so you can care for us in our golden years - diapers are very expensive.

Thanks Jason for the inspiration for this post.

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Someone near and dear to my heart asked me to write this blog.  So here it goes Dotane, this bud’s for you as the beer commercial says.  There are times in our lives we need to re-group or even re-build.  That’s when we need to get back to basics.

This year I’ve had family members; friends and even I after being sick that needed to get back to living healthy lives and focusing on becoming strong both physically and mentally.

Sleep - go to bed at the same time every night.  I don’t expect you to be a monk, but normally get your zzzzz’s.  Reading before sleep is much better than watching the TV.

Eating - make sure everything you put in your mouth counts.  Eat fruit, vegetables, lean meats and healthy fats.

Exercise - if you’re not feeling like running a marathon and probably you aren’t; how about a 20 minute walk a day as a start.  Keep it up and you’ll see you feel better and look better.

Relaxation - I went to a doctor back in the 80’s to help with my habit of picking my face.  This was a nervous habit I had had since when my Mother was an alcoholic.  It is common for people to pick up nervous habits and most people have some form.  There is a relaxation program that works extremely well, every time.   It is called autogenic relaxation.  I will teach it to you.

Week 1 - sit in a comfortable chair or lay down.  Do a cleansing breath and close your eyes. Once your body is quiet and relaxed; visualize an image that you find relaxing.  It may be a sandy beach with waves lapping on the shore, a cool stream of a waterfall, or a soft, fluffy cloud lazily drifting across the sky.  Repeat after me “my right arm is heavy, my right arm is heavy”.  Do this 5-6 times, do another cleansing breath.  Repeat the process 3-4 times.  Concentrate and become aware where your arm touches the chair/bed, where your fingers are touching.  If you mind wanders to your grocery list or your rotten teenager, just come back to your heavy arm.  Do this for one week and I will give you the instructions for week two next week.  It takes less than 5 minutes.  Do have 5 minutes 3 times a day to feel better?  Don’t worry if you have trouble concentrating, it comes with practice. It takes several weeks to master but once you do, you can call upon it for the rest of your life.

Positive Influences - avoid negative people.  You know those people who want to commiserate and tell you even worse stories than yours.  I refer to them as “ambulance chasers”.  They are only really interested when there is a train wreck and drama.  Seek out people who are encouraging and living the way you want to live.  They are out there.

Help someone - I find this incredibly powerful.  If I am feeling bad, once I’m finished with the “pity party”, I go and do something for someone else and it always makes me feel better.

That’s my take on life hygiene.  There is nothing in there you haven’t heard before.  I’ve never had an original idea but I do steal from the best.  If you have other ideas, I would truly love to hear them.

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I find it quite fascinating that the majority of people I have encountered over my lifetime either don’t apologize or do it so badly (which is almost worse).  Apologizing is incredibly powerful if done properly and for the right reasons.  The husband who is “sorry” in a churlish tone to try and move on from a unpleasant conversation with their mate certainly does not qualify as an apology.  Or as someone in my past life was apt to do was to apologize and in the same breath tell me it was my fault he did it.  I never quite understood that one.  I’m sure you will be able to furnish me some really good examples of what I refer to as the “no-apology apology”.

I’ll start by giving you my take on how to apologize properly and when it is appropriate and not appropriate.  I currently have a wonderful person in my life who apologizes for everything; actually she uses it more as an expression.  I’m trying to break her of this habit, wish me luck!  Apologize when you recognize you are wrong and it is causing conflict with another person or you’ve hurt someone’s feelings.  Apologize without qualifications, as soon as you qualify it with a “but…” you wipe out the goodness.  Here are examples of bad and good ways to apologize.

Bad - I’m sorry I hurt your feelings, I‘m so pressured at work. (you’re  blaming work and not taking responsibility)

Good - I’m sorry I hurt your feelings (simple, sincere - if you really did something bad you may have to add “Please forgive me”.

Taking responsibility when we hurt each other (intentionally or unintentionally) goes a long way to harmonize our interactions and build trust.  I used to think that if you didn’t mean to hurt someone’s feelings you don’t need to apologize, I have since learned this is not so.  You don’t need to apologize for the bad intention, you can apologize for how it made the person feel.

We all walk around with our emotional baggage we’ve built up over the years.  If yours is weighing heavily on you and interfering with your life, I hope you will find a way to empty it and put it down.  It’s such a relief.

Then there are those who think an apology wipes out any magnitude of sins.  An apology can only do so much.  Once a young child I know made a serious mistake and he apologized sincerely.  I told him that I was glad he apologized however it did not erase what he did.  I told him that if someone drives their car over someone’s foot and crushes it and apologizes, that the foot is still crushed.

I first became interested in the subject of how people apologize because my Father did not.  Actually in my lifetime he apologized either twice or three times.  This was not a trait I admired.  I vowed that I would be someone who could admit my mistakes especially with my children.  I always apologize to them when I blow it.  You know the day you come home, you had a crappy day at work and then you walk in and your teenagers have left dirty dishes all over the living room.   Then you get so mad at them you would think they had murdered someone in cold blood.  The punishment did not fit the crime.  It was time to apologize.  Actually I feel much better after I apologize.  I find it cleansing.

Men seem to have a harder time apologizing.  Some cultures teach that to admit your mistake is to be perceived as weak and lacking leadership.  I believe that to recognize your faults, take responsibility and to learn from your mistakes is the definition of strength.

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Today I said good bye to my friend Ben Dagenais.  Last Tuesday he literally dropped dead at work.  No efforts to revive him helped and he died Tuesday afternoon when he suffered a fatal heart attack while walking up the stairs after lunch.

This was shocking to all of us who loved him.  He has a lovely wife Chantal and two sons Nicolas and Frederick.  Ben and I met four years ago when I joined the Commercial team.  He and I worked on major accounts for Heavy Maintenance.  We worked tirelessly together to get aircraft delivered on time and to invoice them correctly.  No easy task!

Often we would have to go see customers to “take a beating” and afterward we would laugh our faces off in the parking lot because at the end of the day, we did our best which is pretty damn good and hey it’s not the end of the world.

So this 41 year old man who didn’t smoke, rarely drank and was an athlete drops dead at work.  How can that be, we were all in shock.  One minute you’re alive and then you’re dead.  No fair.  We all know life isn’t fair but seriously (his expression) this is really not fair.

Chantal and Ben were deeply in love and had a wonderful life.  Ben had a multi-generational home built so Chantal’s parents could live beside them.  This is now such a blessing as she will not be alone to take care of them.  I’m sure he did not think this would be the outcome.

Today was Ben’s funeral.  It was standing room only.  Even our President attended which I thought was really nice.  People came from all over the country, even past employees all there to pay homage to a truly superior human being.

I was fine because I was slightly medicated by gravol until the priest said that it was time for us to separate from Ben.  I saw the pallbearers in the back of the church.  That’s when it hit me, this is real, he’s not coming back.  Then I started to cry which I was unable to do all week because it was so surreal that someone so full of life could be felled in a moment.

It was a lovely service in a small intimate church on the water front.  How beautiful it must be in the summer. After the service I approached his wife, Chantal to express my condolences.  What she said to me will stay with me for the rest of my life.  She said, that Ben loved me so much.  This was incredibly comforting because I loved Ben.

So my dear friend, I promise never to forget you because you are unforgettable.  I truly believe we will meet again.  You are so full of love and love never dies.  Thank you for all the support and caring ever since I met you. I miss you so much.

Your Friend Kay

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