My 100 days plan suffered from inadequate planning.

This is the new plan.

I have about a month* until my black belt test.

I am taking a course in getting my mind around time (calling it time management doesn’t begin to cover how comprehensive this course is.)

I have a new exercise plan with a lot more cardio.

AND, most importantly, I have finally wrapped my mind around how to write more.

I have always had this disconnect with my writing. I can write thousands of words a day under pressure. When I have an idea or a plan I can go mad with the typing and what comes out is not awful (at least most of the time). But then I will have these long periods of time where writing just doesn’t seem to fit. I don’t feel like I have much to say, it seems like a waste when there are other concrete things to do.

When I teach writing classes I remind people that all writing is useful and it’s like practicing lay-ups in basketball, each practice session brings you closer to where you want to be, and it’s not wasted. I understood that intellectually and believe it fully, but I hadn’t really seen how to bring it into my daily practice.

Now I have. I am going to methodically work my way through my writing advice books and do the exercises (at least the ones that seem ‘right’ to me), and consider them the same way I consider practicing my patterns in taekwondo – steps towards my eventual goal. And the thing is, like with exercise or practice (activity generates more activity), the more I write, the more things I think of to write about. So, any writing practice that I do will automatically help me get my writing work done because I will already be in the writing mindset. It’s win win.

So, here I am, with a plan for my writing, a plan for my exercising, a plan to prepare for my black belt, and a plan to get the biggest challenge area of my house done. This is the part in the movie where the heroine (that’s me!) starts working bit by bit and makes her way to where she wants to be. It would be boring to watch, of course, so the director puts in a montage – a collection of scenes (with music) that show her changing rapidly, her pages and muscles piling up, her house getting sorted. In real life, you don’t get to speed through that part, so here I am creating my montage, piece by piece. When I look back, it will seem pretty damn fast.

The key though? I actually enjoy the process of exercising, and the practice of writing – I hate THINKING about writing or exercising, but when I can actually sink in and just do it? It feels good.

The other thing I am currently working on is being better at just showing up, and being there imperfectly. So while, like the montage, this blog will get better as I go, some of the entries are going to be a bit meh in the meantime. These things happen. 🙂

*I’m really good at doing things for just a month, so this should work just fine.

Apparently, this Feminist (a.k.a. me) is smirky. It's because I feel ridiculous taking a picture of myself.

Feminism is not over, our work is not done.

The fact that people still wince when Feminism comes up means there is still a lot of work to do. People wince because some parts of the media, of the ‘old boys’ club have convinced them that Feminists are mean, scary, unshaven bitches. People wince because one (or 4) Feminists they met were harsh and horrible.

I understand how that experience would shape your perception, but here’s the thing:

Some Feminists may be mean, scary, unshaven bitches, they might be harsh and horrible, but that’s not because they were Feminists, that’s because they are mean, scary, harsh, horrible people, the Feminist part is a coincidence. They don’t know how to make their points any other way.

I had some rotten teachers when I was in school, that didn’t make me decide all teachers were rotten. I’ve been served by some pretty lousy customer service people, that didn’t make me decide all customer service people were lousy. And I’ve met some socialists who wanted to destroy everyone in their path who disagreed with them, and others who just wanted change to happen, and they were willing to keep pushing until it did. That didn’t make me think all socialist were nutjobs.

I’m a Feminist (obviously), please do me the courtesy of judging me for who I am, not because you once met someone who used the same label and made it a bad thing.

AND consider, perhaps, that maybe that harsh (or not so harsh) person put you on the defensive. Humans seem to lean toward binaries, so to like one thing means to dislike another, so if you hear Feminist, maybe you automatically jump to the idea that Feminists are anti-masculine.  Let go of that for a second and consider what else that could mean – you don’t have to let me convince you, just consider the possibility that you don’t have the whole picture. You can also do a quick read of this great Tomato Nation post to see what Feminism is really about.

I confess, I used to be put off by Feminism. When I was a teenager I believed I was equal to the guys but I was afraid of the backlash from calling myself a Feminist so I would use that stupid line ‘I’m not a Feminist but I believe in equal rights.’ That was me claiming my space while hiding from a label that might cause me hassle. Sometime in my 20s, I stopped hiding and just claimed Feminism.

Feminism is about equal rights for women. AND equal rights for men. It’s about breaking down this gender bullshit that we pretend is natural, and deciding for ourselves how we want to contruct and conduct ourselves. It’s not about putting men down, and it’s not about exalting women. It’s about seeing how our current social structure is failing us all.

It’s about fixing a society that dismisses women, it’s about getting rid of the lousy idea that women are men’s property – to be used, abused and tossed aside. No not EVERY man thinks that, of course not, it’s very few, but until we have a better structure for dealing with the ones that do, we need Feminists calling attention to the system that supports that attitude. And our system does. Big time. I know you, as a reasonable person, don’t, but the system was designed when women were considered property and we haven’t rooted out and eliminated all the parts that still function that way.

Feminists see all this change as needing to start with fixing women’s current status, that’s why we use the word FEMinism. We need to bring women up to the position of men, and then when everyone is at the same table, on the same level playing field, we can make even more change.

Found here: http://nirmukta.com/2012/08/08/an-apology-to-chally-kacelnik/

The thing is though, bringing women to the table, onto the field, that will help free men too.  We’re not looking to downgrade the masculine, we’re looking to get riddy of the shitty parts of both masculinity and femininity – the parts that say that men aren’t capable of behaving themselves, the parts that say that women can expect to live off men, that kind of thing.

I’m a Feminist for me, for my Sisters, for my Mother, for my Mother-in-Law, and for my female friends. I’m a Feminist for my husband, my sons, my Dad, my Father-in-law, my Brothers-in-law and my male friends. I’m a Feminist for you.

I want change in our world. I want everyone to be able to live the lives they choose unconstrained by outdated notions of masculinity and femininity. Yeah, I know that’s a big wish, but if we don’t keep trying it will never happen.

I was doing some yoga with my sister’s Girl Guides on Friday and when we got to  Warrior Pose (my favourite!) I said something about sinking into the pose and a bunch of thoughts clicked together for me.

When I do yoga properly – and by that I mean a focused practice instead of using yoga poses to stretch after a workout – I tap into a sort of stillness in my brain. That stillness means I can ‘sink’ into my poses like sliding into a tub of warm water, total absorbed in that feeling of being exactly where I want to be. That feeling seems to come from outside – like everything is aligning – and inside – as my muscles sort themselves into poses.

The same thing can happen when I meditate, after a certain point in my cycle of breathing I find my shoulders dropping away from my ears, and my breath takes on its own rhythm. It sounds weird to describe it, but it seems to pour in from the world around and, meanwhile, it’s almost as if I am breathing out my meditation as much as I am experiencing it inside my head. I almost expect people around me to end up meditating by proximity – like a contact zen 😉

And my writing can bring me there too, but I don’t usually realize it WHILE I’m writing. It’s afterwards, when I come out of my writing reverie, that I realize I was in that place of stillness. I think if I was conscious of the stillness while I was writing, it would ruin it somehow. For the record,  I can shift myself *back* into it once I am out, but I lose my perception of the stillness while I am there.  My writing also seems to come from somewhere else, even while it bubbles up inside my brain.

One of the purposes of yoga poses was/is to prepare the body to sit for long periods in meditation. I think of yoga (and meditation) as bringing me the focus I need for writing, preparing me to stand for long periods while I write and helping me to have the patience to work through a story until it becomes clear.

Obviously there is a connection between all of these things, my writing, my yoga and my meditation, and it only makes sense for three focused types of activities to bring me a similar feeling. I guess I hadn’t realized that it was a physical and mental feeling until I said that phrase ‘sink into it’ on Friday. I do ‘sink’ into all three things, and I look forward to that sinking before I do either one.

It just took that word for me to realize how similar that inside-outside, in-the-zone, tapping-into-something-else, feeling was in all three cases.

Sinking in – I totally recommend it.

Right now, all over the world people in Guiding and Scouting are celebrating the joint birthdays of their founders Robert and Olave Baden-Powell. Guides call it Thinking Day, Scouts call it Founder’s Day, but it’s all the same celebration, thankfulness for the things that Guiding and Scouting have brought to the world.

All day, I’ve been thinking about what Guiding means to me.

I’m not technically a member right now, but I volunteer when my sister Neece (or anyone else) needs me, and I just sent in a entry for the Guides Canada blog.  I still feel connected to Guiding, I honour the goals of the organization, and I’m looking for ways to use my skill set to the Guides’ advantage. I’m not yet totally involved, but I always feel the pull to give back to the organization that I love.

Guiding was a vital part of the formation of my feminist perspective – one of the guiding (ha!) principles of my life. There were other contributing factors of course (my parents, my teachers, my friends), but Guiding was a huge movement that told me that I was okay just as I was.

Here I am in my Guide uniform. Can you find me?

When I was in Guiding, my competence was assumed. Just think about that, how huge that is. I was a ten year old girl and my competence was assumed.

Ten year old girls have to be one of the most dismissed groups on the planet, yet in Guiding,  my leaders and my program expected that I could do or learn to do whatever needed to be done.  My competence at leading a group, carrying a bucket of water, setting up a tent, tying knots, learning a language, doing a science badge, was never in question. Instead, it was treated as a given.

That’s not to say that I wasn’t supposed to ask for help, help was always offered and encouraged, but it was assumed that all of these little girls could carry heavy things, cook meals on a camp stove, run fast, climb high, go on adventures, and learn and execute complicate tasks. Never once was I told to do or not to do something because I was a girl.

What a treat for any kid, but especially for a ten year old girl in 1982. In many other arenas I was put down, shut up, directed to be lady-like (ha!), but for two hours each week and seven days in the summer, I was free to be myself. My strong, competent, opinionated, self.

Yes, not only was it okay for me to be competent, but it was also okay for me to be opinionated – imagine! In school I did a bit of blending, making myself a bit smaller so I wouldn’t disturb the order of things,  so I wouldn’t get the attention of the guys who were intent on keeping girls ‘in their place.’ I feigned squeamishness and silliness, not all the time, but enough to make me feel sad about it.

At Guides though I could take up my full share of the space. And it was fantastic.

I wonder, if I hadn’t had that public arena of Guiding, would I have been a different person? Would my feigned squeamishness and silliness become real? Would my smaller self have become my whole self? Would I have been lost?

I don’t know, and I hope not, but I’m glad I didn’t have to find out.

Happy Thinking Day, Guides!

Keep taking up your full space – the world needs every part of you.