Author: Peter Mis

Maybe You Should Pick Yourself First?

Maybe You Should Pick Yourself First?

It was a one-sided conversation, but sometimes that one side can tell you everything.

Standing in line at the grocery store is always longer around the holidays. It’s part of the tradition. Along with the obligatory crying baby, many in line kept themselves busy by scrolling through their phones waiting for the convoy of overstuffed shopping carts to eventually make their way to the cashier.

One woman in line was deeply engaged in what seemed to be a rather significant phone call. In this age of indifference, having personal conversations in public spaces has become rather ordinary. And this was a very personal conversation.

It was evident that this woman was having some sort of relationship issues. And the disdain and self-loathing radiating from her words indicated that this was not the first relationship she’s had issues with.

“I know how to pick ‘em, don’t I?”

You could feel her pain in those words, a pain I sensed she was very familiar with as history appeared to be repeating itself once again.

Maybe her problem wasn’t who she was picking. Maybe the problem is who she wasn’t picking.

Herself.

Relationships don’t come with instructions, do they? You kind of have to figure them out on your own. Ideally, though, you’d try and figure yourself out first. Traumas, those intentionally and unintentionally inflicted, can often instead send us down the path of looking outside of ourselves for what we can Continue reading “Maybe You Should Pick Yourself First?” →

Let Go Or Be Dragged

Let Go Or Be Dragged

A well-timed Zen proverb appeared in my social feed.

“Let go or be dragged.”

We’ve all been dragged, haven’t we? Dragged by holding on to expectations of wanting What Is to be other than it actually is. Dragged by well-intentioned hopes which have always remained nothing more than hopes.

Yet we continue to hold on, ever so tightly, our emotional hands blistered and bloodied as we relentlessly and blindly tighten our grip further.

Let go or be dragged.

Releasing expectations is always easier on paper. It requires getting comfortable with the uncomfortable, but in doing so it also creates the space for peace.

Your peace.

My peace.

As we head into a new year, we get to decide what we are willing to take with us. As far as expectations, the only ones I intend to take with me are the only ones I can control.

The ones I have for myself.

I’m letting go of the others.

So my blistered and bloodied hands can heal.

So I can get a more solid grasp on fulfilling the promise of my own creation.

Continue reading “Let Go Or Be Dragged” →

Life Lessons From A Brick Oven Pizza

Life Lessons From A Brick Oven Pizza

It was the best pizza I’ve ever had.

And I’ve eaten a lot of pizza.

Pizza has somehow become rather important to me. I’ve baked my fair share of pies and I’m always trying to improve my results, often reverse engineering each bite of my favorite pizzas to try and uncover the secrets hidden inside. Having done my best to befriend my server she eventually revealed the four ingredients used to make the dough which I hoped to replicate at home.

“Flour, water, salt, and yeast” is what she told me.

“And…time.”

Time. An often overlooked ingredient. Time is what’s needed for flour, water, salt, and yeast to come together and fully develop their flavor profile. While some may try to manipulate the process, like most things in life the best results usually can’t ever be rushed.

Ours is a world at odds with patience. It’s a world which rewards the immediate, even if the immediate is inferior to what could instead be more fully developed if given the time to do so.

As I’ve worked to more fully evolve in life, I’ve come to understand that my evolution is a process, a process which takes time. At times I, too, am at odds with patience, trying to force a process which Continue reading “Life Lessons From A Brick Oven Pizza” →

The Epic Struggle Between Two Conflicting Versions Of Me

The Epic Struggle Between Two Conflicting Versions Of Me

It was one of those tough conversations you knew you had to have.

They’re always tougher when you have to have them with yourself.

December is an important month for me. It’s a time of reflection and introspection. Of looking forward and backward at the same time. My best years are the intentional ones and to prepare myself to make the most of the next 12 months I commit a significant amount of time during the last month of the year setting my course forward.

Going through some notes from a year ago, I found a list of well-intended intentions set for this year which I never actually followed through on. Intentions are promises I make to myself, and this list represented a list of promises I failed to keep. Me letting me down.

My intention setting process involves a vetting sequence. Intentions start as wishes and grand ideas, and while they feel exciting in the moment, I’ve got quite good at challenging myself as to whether I would be willing to actually commit myself to them. Are these wishes and grand ideas something I can honestly see myself getting behind 100%? Or are they simply wishes and grand ideas which would be nice to have but I know I’d never do what it takes to make them happen?

After discovering my list, it looks like I need to refine my vetting process a bit more.

As I looked at my list of unrealized intentions I initially felt a habitual degree of anger towards myself. “I let myself down yet again, didn’t I?” “I thought I had grown past doing this to myself.” I quickly pivoted to Continue reading “The Epic Struggle Between Two Conflicting Versions Of Me” →

Your Past Doesn’t Have To Be Your Future

Your Past Doesn’t Have To Be Your Future

I’ve never been good at being dishonest to others.

But I can be pretty good at lying to myself.

Manipulating the truth when engaging with others would always make me cringe, a painful side effect of knowingly not honoring the truth. Yet that cringe could easily be suppressed when I’d engage myself in discussing how I was not honoring the truth of my own authentic self. Lying to yourself by not accepting your true self is quite traumatic. But if that’s all you’ve known, it doesn’t really feel like you’re being emotionally dishonest with yourself at all.

We instinctively know when we are living inconsistently with our authentic self. Life feels like a compromise, we know we are settling, we disregard our value system and boundaries, we’re forcing what we know isn’t for us, often ignoring the clearly visible red flags and warning signs in hopes of making something work that really was never designed to work. It’s a painful process to witness or experience.

Somewhere along our life’s journey we felt our authentic self wasn’t good enough. Childhood is often a place where the vision of who we are is contorted and molded into who we are told to be. Parental expectations, peer pressure, conditional love, and a fear of being alone are powerful forces that can dim Continue reading “Your Past Doesn’t Have To Be Your Future” →

Are You Waiting To Become You?

Are You Waiting To Become You?

Commitment without the commitment.

The best of both worlds?

It’s early December and New Year’s Resolution season is just a few weeks away. For me, early December had always been a great time to reflect upon where I was in life and to set the resolutions for what I wanted to accomplish starting on January 1st.

It really was the best of both worlds. Or so that’s what I would tell myself. I made a commitment without the need to yet actually commit. For the next few weeks I could still be the person I was while feeling good about the future commitment I had made. Like, sure, I’m committed to getting myself in better shape, but until the first of the year I’m just going to keep doing the things which got me out of shape.

Sometimes logic isn’t so logical. But I never let that get in my way.

When I knew where I wanted to go, why was I content on waiting until the first of the year to actually start?

Often we know what we want to accomplish in life. We know who it is we want to grow into. Yet, for some reason many of our aspirations remain left undone, leaving us undone in the process. Change and Continue reading “Are You Waiting To Become You?” →

Turkeys, Trees, and The Tradition Of Pain

Turkeys, Trees, and The Tradition Of Pain

There’s nothing like the smell of chicken hearts and gizzards boiling in a sauce pan on the stove.

Deb is a holiday traditionalist. And one of her most important Thanksgiving traditions is making her Mom’s stuffing. It’s become a more significant tradition now that her Mom is no longer able to celebrate the holiday with her. For years they’d gather the day before Thanksgiving to combine the bread and the meat and the spices and, yes, the boiled chicken hearts and gizzards, and create a staple of their holiday meal.

It was more than just making stuffing. It was a bond between mother and daughter forged in the ritual of perpetuating a very important tradition.

Beautiful.

Yet, now bittersweet.

Sometimes the holidays can be quite painful. T’is not always the season to be jolly. Loss and emptiness can be excruciatingly magnified at a time of expected joy and glee. We’ve all experienced our own form of hurt, longing for what once was, longing for what never was, now seasonally contrasted against the backdrop of all things shiny and bright.

I think back to some of the more traumatic events in my life, wounds annually reopening as I balance my own levels of bitter and sweet this time of year. I think of friends and their childhood traumas and how their inner pain silently crushes their holiday spirit, no matter how much they may be smiling on the Continue reading “Turkeys, Trees, and The Tradition Of Pain” →

Life’s Energy Will Meet You Exactly Where You Are

Life’s Energy Will Meet You Exactly Where You Are

I don’t know why but of late my social media feeds have felt like one never-ending commercial for psychics and manifestation coaches.

It’s not too often I read my horoscope, so I’m not sure why the algorithms thinks it’s something I have a real interest in. While I have a basic working understanding of the zodiac, it’s never been something I’ve felt compelled to more deeply explore.

Horoscopes can be fun to glance at once in a while, but for me they’ve always felt rather passive. Like, I don’t have to actually do anything. Fate is working out all the details and my destiny will be delivered directly to me.

One thing I’ve learned about life is destiny doesn’t do delivery. That is, if we’re home sitting on the couch waiting for our realized dreams to simply show up we’ll be sitting on the couch for a very long time. The life we want to experience requires us to actually go and create it. The Law fo Attraction requires us to actually take action, aligned and intentional action. The spiritual forces of the Universe will help us to Continue reading “Life’s Energy Will Meet You Exactly Where You Are” →

The Long Road To Emotional Self Reliance

The Long Road To Emotional Self Reliance

I’ve been told I can be a bit extreme at times. If it’s worth doing, it’s worth over doing, right? It’s usually to my detriment, even if I know that going in. Yet here I go again, diving in deep.

I’ve never fully understood why.

It’s been a little over a week since I had my last sips of caffeine. Which is a huge deal for me, because I would inhale caffeine in the form of fresh brewed iced tea. Lots of iced tea. Most mornings caffeine was the BFF I couldn’t wait to hook up with. My habit was supported by the availability of fairly good iced tea I’d get a convenience store I would intentionally pass by each day. It’s cheap and easily accessible, the perfect breeding ground for me to over-indulge excessively.

As much as I enjoyed the first few of the several tall cups of my beverage each day, at some point it would start working against me. There is a diminishing return on the amount of caffeine I’d often consume. For a beverage which is supposed to perk me up, at the end of the day I’d be anything but perked. Yet tomorrow I would repeat the same process.

As I’ve made my way through the expected brutality of caffeine-withdrawal headaches, I began to look at my relationship with iced tea. Why do I drink so much? Why do I need to drink it at all?

This line of inner questioning was reminiscent to a conversation I had with myself 23 years earlier regarding my alcohol consumption. It was a relationship much like the one I had with iced tea. Why did I Continue reading “The Long Road To Emotional Self Reliance” →

You Owe Yourself A Sunrise

You Owe Yourself A Sunrise

Sometimes we’re so busy looking we simply don’t take time to see.

It’s Saturday morning and I find myself just before dawn standing alone at the edge of the reservoir. It’s extremely peaceful, the only break in the silence comes from the sound of water fowl off in the distance. The eastern sky is transitioning in color as the sun begins to slowly rise, and a spectacular show it was, the colors changing by the moment as the sun lifted higher in the sky.

I can’t remember the last time I treated myself to a sunrise, to intentionally set off in the darkness and position myself to witness such a spectacular gift of Nature. Sunrises had not been the priority that they once were for me. Life gets busy and before you know it many of the self care rituals I had established for myself slowly became less frequent.

The things that reconnect you with you are not trivial. The things that ground you and re-energize you Continue reading “You Owe Yourself A Sunrise” →