(Reprinted with permission from LOST & FOUND ON LANA’I: The Trials & Transformation of One New Yorker Living in Paradise, 1995, by Marcia Zina Mager)

The other day, in the midst of one of my OH-MY-GOD-WHAT-AM-I-DOING-WITH-MY-LIFE fits, I stumbled across this incredibly profound quote from the wise educator/philosopher Joseph Campbell:

"You've got to let go of the life you've planned," he said, "to live the life that's waiting for you..."

         Wow.

         The only problem with that precious nugget of universal wisdom is that I'm really not so crazy about "letting go." I tend to get a whole bucketful of butterflies in my stomach when it comes to the whole concept of "change." And that's what I think he's really talking about: letting go of our safe, comfortable goals and ideals to pursue what fires our soul; following our bliss, reaching for that passionate possibility in life, going the distance for our very own "field of dreams."

         It sounds so wonderful. Yet I know, at least for me, the gap between the IDEA of following my bliss and the REALITY of reaching for what my soul truly desires is a very, very wide and frightening abyss.

         It's not that I don't like the IDEA of, say, traveling to exotic places, for instance. But boarding that plane and saying good-bye to the people (and pets) I love makes my eyes moisten (and my palms drip with sweat!). I love the IDEA of risk and adventure: Marcia, the pioneer woman, zooming across the outback in her battered jeep; or Marcia, the femme fatale leaping out of airplanes. But strap me to a parachute to begin ground practice or point out the scorpion crawling up my sleeve and I'm sure I would turn white as toilet paper and faint dead away.

         I hate to admit it but I guess when push comes to shove regarding those big "follow your bliss" kind of changes, I find myself wanting to crawl underneath my cozy down blanket, hoping "the life that's waiting for me" will wonder where I disappeared to and just go away.

         So I'm asking, what is it about "letting go" and "change" that's so scary? Why is it when you know something needs to change, should change, oughta change, wants to change, it's still so hard to do it. Take those of us who really want to go on consistent exercise programs. We think about it, read about it, watch shows about it, make New Year's resolutions about it. But in the end, well, we just can't seem to do it. Or those people who want to give up smoking. Or the ones who want to end a relationship that's no longer healthy for them. Or those that really want to quit their job, go on safari, or write that novel that's been brewing inside them for so many years. We just can't seem to get around to it.

         One reason, I think, that letting go and making changes is so difficult is because it forces us to walk outside that cuddly little "comfort zone." You know, that invisible circle we live inside of where the temperature is just a bit too warm and we're just a bit too sluggish, but when we think about taking a step outside it, well, all of a sudden, STAR TREK reruns seem awfully inviting.

         Familiarity and comfort are strong draws for most of us. Take that away, even for a little while, and you're left with the one thing that nobody wants -- pain.  The pain of loss, of loneliness, of isolation. And that's why I think "letting go of the life you've planned" is so hard. Because it brings up all those long ago pains and disappointments; the ones from childhood when letting go and making changes actually threatened our well-being and survival. The body remembers those things, even if the mind doesn't. All those gut-wrenching times when pets were lost, or grandparents died, or parents didn't come home, or best friends moved away. Put enough of those childhood `letting gos' together and you've got a grown up body that is dead set against the whole fool notion of change.

         What's the answer then? Giving up and becoming an armchair traveler to gaze longingly at National Geographic? Walking away from those life-long passions and dreams by turning on the tube to live vicariously through the brave characters on the latest movie-of-the-week?  

No. I don't think so.

Passion fuels our existence. Without dreams and possibilities, who are we?  The light that shines in the eyes of someone who has tried and succeeded is too beautiful a light for me to turn my back on. Even if I am frightened. Even if my grown-up mind freaks out, screaming at me, no, you can't do that, it's too risky, too scary, too terribly unfamiliar.

         I believe in what Joseph Campbell said. It may not be easy to embrace his wisdom, but I've got to keep trying. There's a life out there waiting for me. I can feel it. Sometimes on quiet mornings, I can hear it whispering. "Take one small step today," it beckons, "that's all you have to do."

[Reprinted with permission from LOST & FOUND ON LANA’I: The Trials & Transformation of One New Yorker Living in Paradise, 1995, by Marcia Zina Mager]

Love is such a controversial word. Ask a hundred different people and you'll get a hundred different meanings. Hollywood once told us, "Love is never having to say you're sorry." Religions say "God is Love." In the 60s, love was sharing everything, including your mate. Today, self-help books tell us that sometimes “love” can be enabling or co-dependent. The word is tossed around too easily. Turn on the news and you'll find people murdering for "love." Everywhere people are running from it or spending their lives running toward it.

Years ago, I wrote romance novels for a while. Back then, love was a simple formula. Boy meets girl, they fall in love and live happily ever after. But it's not that simple anymore. Love no longer fits into a neat little leather brief case carried by man and woman. Today love can mean that boy meets boy, girl meets girl, boy meets lonely extraterrestrial...

So on the heels of this internationally celebrated Valentine's Day, the question I'm pondering is...what is love? Where do you find it? Is it hunger and starry-eyed longing, like the media tells us in commercials and movies? When I look inside myself for an authentic nuts-n-bolt definition, I find only contradiction. Certainly, I'd like to think of myself as a totally loving person. I love Dennis. I love my family, my friends, my dog and cat. Yet in my life when I look at how I love others, I fall short in my eyes. I see my tremendous limitations. My own insecurities and childhood wounds have conspired at times to push me into the ring with people I care about, swinging with all my might. And often it's not me that goes down for the count.

So how do I find out what love really is? Whenever I find myself in this painful dilemma, my heart gently reminds me of what a wise friend once taught me. His name was Brian and he himself was an extremely wounded man. Yet he once had a powerful insight, a profound vision that perhaps is the most meaningful definition, for me, of what love is really all about.  Brian once told me he died on the operating table, after a brutal bike accident. He was one of those rare people who had a life-after-death experience. But instead of traveling through a long dark tunnel to arrive at a brightly lit spot with smiling relatives reaching toward him, he saw something much simpler. He saw himself as he was: a tall, soft spoken man with haunting blue eyes standing there cradling someone in his arms. But that someone was not a child. It was a full grown man. And much to his surprise, that man was himself. Brian had a vision of cradling Brian. From this fleeting glimpse, he taught me about compassion. Compassion for myself. Compassion for my limitations, for my mistakes, for my deepest, darkest wounds. If I did something I felt was terrible; if I had failed miserably in my own eyes, before I could finish my barrage of self-punishing comments, Brian would interrupt me with a simple question. "Can you have some compassion for yourself?" he would ask quietly. "Compassion for this woman called Marcia who's struggling with this terrible mistake? Can you care about her, right now, even though she's failed?"

Inevitably that gentle question would allow me to let out a long deep sigh. A kind of peace would settle around me. And I would look inside myself and discover it wasn't that hard to answer "yes." 

         That, to me, is what love is all about. Compassion for ourselves. Because it's only then -- when I'm willing to care about myself no matter what I've done or said or thought -- that I can lift my eyes to another human being and say, with authenticity and power, I love you.

         Happy Valentines Day.

It’s a new year. 2023. New beginnings! Fresh start! Brand new journal! Vision boards!

Be better. Be bigger. Be more. Do more. Reach your goals. Achieve your dreams!

Gosh, I’m exhausted…

What about just relaxing? What about just looking at the clouds? What about sitting under a tree? Dipping my tea bag? Listening to the weed whackers outside my window?

Why isn’t that enough?

I am so tired of the pressure to do more and be more and grow more. It’s an endless loop! The demands and expectations never seem to end. Every television commercial, every glossy magazine page, every social media ad. Everything in our culture keeps shouting:

GO GO GO!

DO DO DO!

BE BETTER THAN WHERE YOU ARE.

Why isn’t sitting in my living room petting my cat enough? Why isn’t carrying a shopping bag stuffed with groceries enough? Why isn’t waking up in the morning enough?

Every spiritual teacher under the sun preaches being present. Slowing down. Living in the Now. But it seems as if everything in us resists. Stillness is too quiet! Peace is too boring. The mind keeps shouting, Get up, move, do something IMPORTANT!!!

I once wrote a poem about it titled Call an Ambulance:

Stillness has gotten a bad rap.

The accusations are endless:

Uneventful.

Uninteresting.

Just too damn quiet!

Yet the hummingbird disappears

like a shooting star

right before my very eyes.

And the distant thunder,

like an atom bomb,

wakes up the whole sky.

If it got any more exciting

I’d keel over from a heart attack.

So here’s my spiritually correct/TV-infomercial-incorrect New Year’s resolution to myself for 2023…

RELAX!

For God’s sake, just relax! Just be who I am, right now, right here, puffy eyes, bad breath, stained tee shirt and all. 

Want to join me?

When I was five months pregnant, I woke up Christmas morning in Mililani, Oahu, to a beautiful, eighty-degree day and felt wildly depressed. We were still new to the islands and our families were five thousand miles away.

This isn’t Christmas, I barked at my husband. I’m from New York!  I need snow! I need cold! I need creamy hot chocolate and rosy-cheeked ice skaters gliding around Rockefeller Center! The last thing my hormonally challenged, burgeoning body wanted was hot tropical sun.

 Fortunately, my husband wasn’t subject to those mother-to-be mood swings. Calmly, he gathered some musty sweaters and led me to the car. Where are we going?!! I protested. Fifteen minutes later we pulled into the Ice Palace parking lot - an indoor ice rink , the only one in the entire state. This isn’t Rockefeller Center, I complained.  But the instant I stepped inside and laid eyes on the happy skaters and twinkling Christmas lights, my sweaty, swollen body let out a long, contented ahhhhh….

 So I ordered my hot chocolate.  But the young girl behind the counter informed me there wasn’t any; the hot chocolate machine was broken.  She must have seen my crestfallen expression, though, because she quickly offered to hand-stir some.  Gratefully, I accepted. So there I sat shivering, sipping my grainy hot chocolate, cuddled against my husband, our yet-to-be-born son cozy beneath layers of old sweaters and young love.

 That day turned into a cherished family ritual. Every single Christmas Day since (for almost a quarter of a century), after a long morning of unwrapping presents, my husband Dennis, our son Reyn, and I wrap ourselves in sweaters so we can slip and slide to our heart’s content inside the Ice Palace.  It may not be Rockefeller Center. But there’s an icy rink, cheerfully loud Christmas music, and they’ve repaired the hot chocolate machine so you can burn your tongue on a perfectly blended cupful of the stuff.

Gosh, what more can an irritable ex-New Yorker ask for?

P.S. That’s us celebrating Christmas Day, four years ago. The pandemic sadly shut the Ice Palace doors in 2020 but we’re overjoyed to learn that they are getting ready to reopen by Christmas Eve! I’ve already gathered my pile of musty old sweaters, frayed mittens, silk long johns, and that well-worn Santa hat. Grab a wool scarf and stop by! You’ll either find me on the ice (hopefully upright) or sipping some delicious, tongue-scalding hot chocolate!