Ready, Set .....GO Time!

It is 6:54 AM and I enter the kitchen, just about ready to leave to drive up to Santa Barbra to sell for my business, to find my husband sitting at the kitchen table at his laptop, in his pajamas. No shower, no shave, just sitting there clacking away...
GRRRRRRR!
When he asked the night before what the plan was, I told him we were leaving early in the morning for Santa Barbra. HE said "We should leave at 7:00."
I unwisely took that to mean that we would LEAVE at 7:00....obviously ...he meant he would stop writing at 7:00 and then start getting ready. I should expect departure time to be well, sometime after the shower, shave and a sundry of other habits...one which includes a maddeningly slow sauntering between the house and the car when he has to go back to retrieve something he left behind...maddening! Insanity!!! Meandering like we are in a museum just drifting along and admiring 17th century art!

By the time we are in the car leaving at 7:30 something, I am fuming like a steam power plant, totally stressed out about being in time and sputtering obscenities under my breath, trying to eat my breakfast all the while (which was the only reason I didn't kill him on the spot, he did make my breakfast to go before I came into the kitchen). I am getting a stomachache, completely distraught that our "day out together" is starting out like a big turd, and filled with anxiety about what happens if we don't get there on time and are turned away after the two and a half hour drive.
I am being a harpy....you know a stressed out human being of the female species. We tend to do that when we are stressed. It sounds like I am making myself wrong and my husband wrong doesn't it? Well, maybe I am, just to create the world of it.

Really though, when I reflect on it, WHAT IS THAT?
That which has us in a pattern of saying we are going to leave on time...we don't and then we are stressed out and angry at each other on the way to what is supposed to be a fun family outing, a precious date night or time to go see family. We don't want to be stressed but we are. What IS that? Why does that keep happening?

Now I know on a fundamental level it is all about integrity. If we don't do what we are committed to, than nothing that we are committed to will work. So we just didn't honor our word. That I get. I tend to however, end up in "make wrong" there...make myself wrong, make my husband wrong...

So I take another look...What Happened was we said we would leave at 7:00. What Happened was Todd just started to get ready at 7:00.
What I made it mean when he did not was that he doesn't care, we are going to miss out, it's the end of the world etc...so I got stressed.

With my PAX work I can also add the perspective of looking at this situation and just get the differences between a man and a woman.

Single focused man. Hears 7:00, moves at 7:00. That's all.

As a responsible woman it suddenly dawns on me that when we agree on a time, that time, as a man, might be the time that he is going to transition from doing what he is focused on to what I need from him.
He would be empowered by having time to transition.

So I am creating "Ready, Set GO time!"
First, get Ready....meaning a sweet reminder perhaps 5 minutes before it's time to transition, 6:25....like a runner who stretches, jogs for a bit and shakes to loosen up.
Then to get Set, 6:30 ( which I am sure he will do on his own, but if not, then again a sweet reminder)which is to actually get in place to make the transition, in this case to close up the lap top...like the runner who bends down, puts feet in place, in the position, ready to launch down the track.
Then to GO Time! Which is the time to actually get up and Go get ready!...running to the finish line.

Once we are both in action, getting ready, at that point, we can create newly, the departure time as a new point of focus, the finish line. 7:00 would be a sure thing then, we would both win!

Now I hear the voices, For crying out loud, just let the man be responsible and tell him what time and leave him alone, he'll do it. You are not his mother.

Ya ya, I get that. I'm not. I am however responsible for how things go. Everything, everything, everything, from my communication. I can't control him, but I can be someone who has things go the way we are committed to going and have him empowered. Say X and produce X...not Y.

Men are single focused, one thing at a time has them win. That doesn't mean they can't do more than one thing at a time, but they preform at optimal levels when they are the hunter tracking the deer and there is just that one thing to focus on.
If we create anytime to do anything, I can see now that creating a Ready Set Go Time! for getting READY would better empower him, then reminding him, like a cheerleader on the side lines( ie:not a harpy) that our goal time to leave is like the next destination, the finish line.
That's just what I see is missing, is honoring what he is committed to and then empowering him in taking on what's next, what I need from him.

Because I know he wants to do that, make me happy, be there on time, leave peacefully, and be appreciated for what we are doing together... we are both committed to that. And it would be sooooooo much more fun if we did that feeling empowered and excited!!!

So I am going to chuck the harpy out the window this weekend, and try this with Todd and my boys, and will post back later.
What do you think about Ready, Set, GO Time! ???

Zen Honeycutt
www.zenspurplegarden.com

P.S. Thanks to Donna who talked this out with me and really helped me to honor my husband.
Oh and by the Grace of God we did get to Santa Barbara on time, I let it go, and my husband was my hero that day... selling our products like hotcakes, being charming but cool to drunk girls at the wine fest, and moving the heavy boxes like a champ. I don't care what time it is, he can always do that for me.

Heart on Fire!

It is my wedding day. The sun is setting and I am resting for a brief moment, watching my friends dancing on the outdoor dance floor in front of the pond. My friend Domique is dancing with a friend of my husbands and she is sexy, enchanting and radiant. Our friend Dan, who is standing beside me, says softly, "Dom knows just the right time to turn her sexiness on and off." In other words, she is fully aware of her femininity and knows how to use it appropriately. I so admire this quality. I want to know how to be like that.

Whoooooooeeeeee!I found out how tonight! have just completed the PAX ( meaning peace) Program "Celebrating Men & Sex". No, this is not a rated R blog. I will share like a lady. I want to clarify right off the bat that I did not take this course because there was anything wrong.I took it to expand what's possible after 11 years of marriage and to learn about men, myself, and to claim my femininity. I am estatic to express the joy, freedom and excitement that I now have around myself, understanding men and their perspective on sex.

It's FASCINATING!!!! The differences in perspective are HUGE! We women make sex mean so much, we make it so complicated, fraught with conditions, strategy, comparisons, resentments, unexpressed desires, past baggage and hurt which we then unconsiously and silently haul into bed with our partners and wonder why we might not get what we need. For men, it's much more simple and fun.
To understand them, we must understand ourselves.I discovered that when we feel sexy, than we are sexy to men and when we express our needs we get what we want. Sounds obvious, but until we actually shift our perspective and experience it, we tend to continue to blame men for everything we are not satisfied with.

We are lovely, charming and enchanting creatures...and in the words of one of the men on the panel, "Magical Mysteries". We have so much feminine power we don't see, use or express in so many ways. My mind is boggled by the different perspectives women and men have....even though so many times my husband tried to tell me, and I didn't listen.
Isn't it so strange how our spouse can say something and yet we just don't get it until someone else, usually a complete stranger, says the very same thing? Is there some kind of invisible spouse filter we put over our ears when we get married?
I am referring here to just one of the many juicy topics we discussed...how much men LOOOOOOOOVE the female body, no matter what it looks like, no mattter what the lumps or bumps, extra curves, freckles, dimples, smells, or colors...they love it. When I got to hear first hand from a complete stranger the love men have for all women it was like something in a deep inner chakra was healed. I wept with joy to know how amazing, appreciative and awesome their love is for us.

They only want to make us happy and we withhold so much when we don't tell them what we want. We deny ourselves so much when we don't ask them what they like, when, where, how, and how often. There is a whole world of communication that could save, expand,and explode the passion in any marriage or relationship if we women just take on the responsibility of being in charge of our innate magical femininity and sexuality.
This course frees a woman from her baggage and opens up a woman to creating the passion and love of her dreams.
I am THRILLED for the future of our marriage!!!
(Which is the foundation of everything, our family, my business, our future.)

I cannot express the magnitude of gratitude I have to the Pax Programs creator, Allison Armstrong and the staff, Paulette and volunteers. Your stand for women and men have peace and love in all aspects of their relationships is phenomenal.
Thank you.

Ladies..sign up for these programs! www.understandmen.com

Zen Honeycutt
www.zenspurplegarden.com

Women Freakin' Rock!

This blog is a shout out to Girlfriends. To Women. To Sisters and Moms.

Tonight was MY night to meet my dear, dear friend Sandi at the spa at the pool. I make sure to have a rock solid night once a month ( for a Mom that's pretty good, I know for you single ladies that is dreadful) where we get together for tea or a soak in the jacuzzi. This time she surprised me. She brought my favorite Chamomile tea to the Jacuzzi and surprise! Blueberry muffins and a pink candle. She lit it and with gracious love, sang Happy Birthday to me and gave me a big smacking kiss on the cheek.
The fact that this busy women made the time to bring gluten free muffins, and take time out from therapy with her special needs child, just moved me.
I had tears in my eyes as I made a secret wish for really good things to happen and realized that this wonderful, loving and beautiful girlfriend of mine gave me my bonus birthday wish this year.

See, my birthday on Tuesday was exactly as I asked for, I told my husband that I wanted Chinese take out for dinner, to open my presents at home, and then go to Yogurtland for tasty frozen yogurt topped with delicious fruity and candy toppings. He gave me exactly what I asked for, plus flowers, and a beautiful necklace, He was my Birthday Hero. His efforts showed the boys that birthdays are fun and that celebrating each other is important. He gave me a happy birthday and it was perfect.

What I didn't even realize until I saw Sandi whip out a lighter and lite the candle, was that now I was going to be able to make my Birthday wish.

That's what girlfriends and sisters and Moms do I realized, they do what our men don't do even when what our men do is PERFECT. Women do things that are just different from men. We finish each other's sentences, we agree with each other and validate every single feeling we ever had, we cry with each other just because and we listen and listen and listen. And oh yeah, talk.

So tonight I give a shout out to Arikka, my first friend, since nursery school, who sang at the top of her lungs with me, Whitney Houston's "We are the Children" in the rain in a canoe in my childhood pond, and let me be free to be me.

I give a shout out to Melanie, my roommate from Brooklyn, who taught me how to dance to "Bonita Applebum" in boarding high school and gave this half white girl some moves and confidence away from home.

I give a shout out to Teresa, my NYC big sista. To Plana who got me Out, after three weeks of holing up from a break up and swearing off men, to go out swing dancing at Mid Summer Night Swing in NYC...where I met my husband.

I give a shout out to Gigi for inspiring me to GO! travel and to Cathy for inspiring me to be a stay at home Mom. And to Christine and Julie for enabling me to be a more peaceful Mom.

I give a shout out to Jennifer, Anisa, Maki and my sister Chi and my Mom...who all love me and listen to me and see me only as the best Mom and wife a woman could be. Who "get me" to me very core and let me fall apart, blubber and sigh...knowing full well that I will pick myself up again, but not in that moment....and it's ok.

I honor women for all the grace, love and compassion that we naturally embody. I am so thrilled to be one of you...to allow myself to be soft,to cry when I am moved and to love pink. Thank you for being a girlfriend to somebody, whomever you are, you contribute more than can be expressed in words.

Zen Honeycutt
www.zenspurplegarden.com

This picture is an older picture, but of a very happy girly time when both my sister and I were pregnant. Look how happy my Mom is! Isn't she adorable?

I am not a "Better Man"

This weekend I participated in a Celebrating Men, Satisfying Women workshop with PAX
(meaning peace) programs. The view was awesome,and the workshop was:
Unbelievable. Incredible. Freeing. Empowering!

I have heard about the program for over a year now. Many of my female friends have done it and all rave about it. I didn't really think it was even remotely interesting at first, I had been married for ten years, my marriage with Todd was fine. We love each other, have fun together and have a great family. In fact we have been doing all kinds of leadership development and training together and our communication was completely transformed from what it used to be.

But sometimes I was still baffled. Sometimes I would sit in bed watching TV to wind down before bed and wonder WHY Todd was so focused on his research on the computer for his book, why he couldn't take some time to be with me without me reminding him? I would begin to feel sorry for myself, then mad at him and then wonder what was wrong with me that he didn't want to come to bed and talk and snuggle? WHAT? I look pretty darn good after 3 kids, I love to listen to him talk about his book...so what was it that has him ignoring me? I would stew in a cloud of grrrrr.
HOW could I get him to spend more time with me?
If I were him I wouldn't be doing this, I would be a better husband...
Resentment would build, I wanted to talk to him, share my day, but if he didn't want to I wasn't going to force him...just let him be... and I would got to sleep feeling bottled up.
I would be cranky the next day we would be like ships passing, the perfunctory kiss or just the "Bye, see ya, love ya" as he went out the door.

This weekend, this example is just one of the hundreds of moments that I got to the source of all the confusion, resentment, communication disasters, squabbles, sighs, eyeball rolling, defeated silences...all those and more...

I was not seeing Todd for the man he is, not seeing him as a man committed to providing for our family, who loves me and the kids. A man focused on a single thing at a time...like a hunter focused on the deer...he is driven to achieve. My complaining about him not snuggling me is draining and confusing to him...as he is doing it all, the research, the book, the work, our beautiful home in a wonderful neighborhood, the caring for the kids, for me, and for the life we created together. I see his heart as huge now, instead of selfish. I see him as creative, loving and committed. And, thanks to this weekend I know how to communicate with him to have him honored and for me to be satisfied as well. I got the WHY, WHAT and HOW! Yea!

I got clear on so many many things. One of the biggest being that by letting Todd be the incredible man that he is, I do not have to police who he is being as a man. I do not have to be a "Better Man". I can let him be a man and I can be me, a Woman.
Very exciting.

I have been in Doing, Doing, Doing mode..or "Man Mode" for so long, surrounded by males, that I forgot what it means to be feminine, to be a Woman.
What's possible now is a whole new realm of ...instead of Zen MASTER....Zen the Temptress, Zen Momma, Queen Zen. Alot more joy, humor, fun and ease as well.
Life is so exciting and thrilling when I take risks, try something new and dive into what's possible....stay tuned to how letting "boys be boys" ( they are NOT girls!..do you hear that school systems?) expands the possibilities for peace and empowerment for my boys.


Thank you for inviting me Donna....and local ladies, if you are available May 15-16th, there is another one,a great deal too, at the Surf and Sand Resort in Laguna Beach, only the most beautiful location ever. www.effectivewomen.com.

Zen Honeycutt
www.zenspurplegarden.com