I’m still not comfortable with being called brave while my daughter was in the hospital with her brain tumor.

Now I’m not saying that to spark a flurry of aggrandizing comments. Ick. No, I’m being perfectly serious.

Being the strong one in the hospital, spending every night at her bedside, forcing her to swallow the necessary drugs to shrink the brain swelling, holding her when she cried out in pain until the nurses came to medicate her comfort … that was not bravery.

That was just me.

Call it maternal instinct or just an expression of who I am. I don’t know. I didn’t think or worry. I just did it.

So, what is courage?

Courage is surrendering the illusion of control.

It took courage for me to surrender control over my twitter account, my facebook, my blog, and hand it over to dear, smart, giving friends so I could concentrate on my daughter.

It took courage to say yes to Alison flying out to spend the week with me, to let her help me and get me stuff, to let her see my (horribly!) messy apartment.

It took courage for me to not micromanage visiting people and let them fend for themselves.

It took courage for me to drop everything. My (still) broken car, my business, the mail, my to do list. To do nothing except care for Gracie and (barely) care for myself.

Courage is when the voices in your head start saying to you “you can’t do this, you don’t deserve this, this is not reasonable, it’s never going to work, what are people going to think, you should really do this, what will happen if …” and instead of you listening to those voices, instead of you obeying those voices, you choose to do something else.

You choose to listen to that quiet whisper instead. That subtle nudge in your soul. That resonance in your body. That knowing that comes from outside of our brain, that comes from trusting in something more than ourselves.

So for those of you fellow control freaks, my challenge to you today is to listen to that quiet whisper the next time it tells you to take the risk, to let someone help you, to take a self-care day, to push yourself further than you thought possible, to quit your job to start the business of your dreams, to hand your heart and soul over to someone who might be starting to love you.

Courage is about choosing to jump, and trusting the universe to catch you.

Yes. Sometimes you may fall, get scraped up, suffer bruises. Be disappointed. Be embarrassed. Go bankrupt. Get your heart broken.

But only by surrendering the illusion of control will you be able to tap into your power. Only then will you have the freedom that comes from knowing that you are capable of handling more than you thought possible.

Only then will you allow into your life the most supportive & challenging people, the most amazing & delicious experiences. Only then can you truly feel ecstasy. Only then will you have the power to change the world.

And the more and more you do it, the easier it gets. It’s still scary & uncomfortable, but you become addicted to that feeling. Because you know what’s on the other side, waiting for you.

So are you listening to that voice yelling at you, or the quiet whisper? Are you going to keep struggling to control everything, or are you going to jump?

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Today in EPW Live I’m streaming from my bed (yes, seriously), mostly just because I was feeling a bit too tired & lazy to get up & sit at my desk.

This episode is a bit more about adventures in extreme self care, including a discussion of pole dancing.

Related posts:

1. 8/8/2010 EPW Live: new in the land of LYT
2. 5 Prompts to Indulge in the Perfect Self Care Day
3. Why I’m Not Setting Goals or Picking Words for 2010

Self care is a continuing struggle for me – both because I need it so desperately to create space for the creative nature of my work – and because I feel so guilty about it.

There’s a voice in my head that always says: “Elizabeth, all this self-care stuff is just an excuse to be selfish. Lazy. To stop doing your to do list. You need to get this stuff done, fast! Stop wasting our time with all this self care crap. Get to work. You don’t deserve this until you get everything done first.”

So last Thursday morning, another voice (non-imaginary and over skype this time), belonging to someone who knows how much I need self care and is completely convinced that I deserve it already, gave me an assignment.

“Today you are going to do something that makes you feel strong, someone that makes you feel smart & successful, something that makes you feel pretty, something that makes you laugh, and something that’s self-indulgent & wasteful. And none of it can be about work or your daughter. And you’ll report back to me when you’ve done each thing.”

I was able to let go of my guilt about self care because I had to do it. Because it was an assignment. (Yes, of course I didn’t actually have to. But it’s just enough of a push to help me let go of guilt.) And, because I wasn’t actually told what to do (just the feelings I would get), it makes this day fun, creative, adventurous … not just another thing on my to do list to complete.

So here’s what happened on my perfect self care day.

Strong: On Thursdays at 11 AM I work out with my personal trainer, Cera (a professional dancer, choreographer, and studio owner). This is not some girly workout — she includes weights and boxing and real pushups, as well as pilates and yoga.

I especially feel strong and kickass when I’m lifting those 15 lb “boy weights” (what I call the hand weights that are all metal and scary looking).

Smart & Successful: I love books. I love the way they smell, the way the pages feel under my fingers. How they make me feel powerful and smart and in control and able to learn anything. So to get that feeling of smart & successful, I headed to to the bookstore at the mall a few blocks form my apartment, and wandered around the shelves.

Saw books I had already read, books by authors I’m friends with, books that I plan to read (and one I bought – that happiness book by Tony Hsieh of Zappos) – books that were old friends and books that were becoming new acquaintances.

Pretty: This one was a bit hard, because I don’t really think of myself as pretty. I guess I think of myself cute and even sexy, but the energy of pretty just doesn’t occur to me. I ended up buying a few necklaces at Old Navy, one was a necklace that I had seen a few times, but had not bought because I didn’t have anything to wear with it.

Really, it only looks good on me topless (how unreasonable, to get jewelry just to wear in private!). But this time, I went ahead & got that for-me-topless necklace. (No, you won’t be seeing a twitpic of that one, my dears.)

Laugh: Trying to find something that makes me laugh that didn’t involve Gracie was hard … I laugh more with her than anyone. The other times I laugh are also caused by a person, or a movie, or some external source. I wanted something where I had fun, where I laughed, not from an external motivation, but due to the fun inherent in the activity itself.

That’s when I remembered how much I like to swing. How when I was little I would swing for hours, alone, moving through the air, peaceful, in rhythm with the universe. So we went to South Park a few blocks from my apartment, and I swung until I was dizzy.

Indulgent & Wasteful: I didn’t decide this ahead of time – I knew that something I wanted that I would normally not buy/do/get would present itself to me during the day – and unlike usual, this time, I would follow the urge.

I did two indulgent things – bought a red jacket (I have enough jackets. who needs a red jacket? but yes, I wanted it) and ate tiramisu at this fancy bakery that I would never normally go into. Mmmmm.

Overall, this was a lovely self care day. I didn’t necessarily do any of the classic self care things – spa day, massages, vacationy stuff – instead, with a few prompts, I found the extreme self care just in ordinary life.

I ended the day feeling peaceful.

Full of energy. In the flow. Grounded. Ready.

And that’s the power of what self care does for us all.

What do you do when you want to fill yourself up? What would go into your perfect self care day?

Bonus – Sexy: Feeling sexy is also included in this self care list. But when I was given this assignment, we both knew I had already done something that made me feel sexy that morning. #ahem #thatisall

Related posts:

1. 8/1/2010 EPW Live: extreme self care, in bed

It had been 5 years since I had been to the eye doctor.  And I wear contacts and have a strong prescription, so I am definitely supposed to go every year.  But it felt just like a "supposed" to me (like I how I am supposed to wipe down the kitchen counter tops each night, which is never going to happen), so I’m never going to be motivated to do it.

But over the last few months my eyes have been driving me crazy.  I had been getting more and more migraines.  And my left eye was getting blurry, to the point of being unable to read after a few hours of work.  Some days I was forced off the computer and from reading after just a few hours.  I found myself reading with my left eye closed.  If I went out for a date night with my husband, I would have to wear my glasses (also 5 years old, scratched, with a replacement screw that does not fit right) because I could not wear my contacts after 7 pm. 

So did I head over to the eye doctor?  No, but I did get an eye doctor referral from my personal assistant.  A first step.  And sat on it for another month or two.

Until finally, on Thursday, I had enough.  After about 2 hours working my left eye blurred up.  I even downloaded a piece of software to force me to take eye breaks every 4 minutes, and that barely helped.  So I made an appointment with the eye doctor for Friday morning.

After she gave me a "look" when I told her I had not had my eyes checked for 5 years, I told her about my eye fatigue problems and she nodded, knowingly.  She efficiently did all the eye exams (wow, they have a bunch of new cool technology in just the last 5 years!) and pronounced my eyes healthy — I just needed an updated prescription and new, next-generation contacts that let in 6x the oxygen to my eyes than my old brand.

I am wearing them now.  Wow.  I could work on the computer for days straight (actually not, because my tendonitis in my wrist hurts, but that’s another story).  I can’t feel my contacts at all — and now I realize that my contacts were bothering me all the time!  No wonder my efficiency had gone down lately. 

Moral of the story?  If you want to work more efficiently, and make more progress on your business and your life — take care of yourself.   Make yourself a better worker by being healthy, having updated and well-working technology, and a good environment.  You are your most valuable resource. 

Hum, perhaps I should have my wrist tendonitus checked? 

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1. The Profoundness of a T-Shirt

Yesterday, I woke up with a migraine. I admit that now.

But yesterday I was in denial. Oh, it’s just a headache, perhaps I needed more sleep (but I had 6 1/2 hours), or drink more water, or my blood sugar was low. I will just drink some water, take two Excedrin, and plow through. I still will research blog promotion, go out to lunch with my familiy, clean up the backyard, play with Gracie, talk to my husband about his work, pick up the dry cleaning, help my husband pick out paint colors for his office, and design my new marketing plan.

But then reality caught up with me. After taking the family to Outback Steakhouse, and eating a steak with Gracie is climbing all over me while trying to keep Gracie from throwing a plate of mac and cheese across the room or her grabbing a serrated knife and waiving it around, I came home and realized that My Head Hurt.

By then, another dose of Excedrin and a cooling patch to the forehead were too late — I had a migraine. Which means, that I will Have a Migraine for 2-4 days.

I don’t have time for this! I have Work to Do, Baby to Care, Husband to Talk, House to Tidy, Blog to Write, Business to Run.

Perhaps that’s it. Perhaps the reason I have migraines is my body’s mechanism to force me to Slow Down. Because, I definitely must slow down when I have a migraine. Obvously not too much though, because I am still typing a blog entry as we speak – but that may just be because I have a fairly high tolerance for pain.

When I decided for forego pain medication for the birth of my daughter, one of my reasons was because of my tolerance of my migraines (typically 4-6 days per month, 2 days with pain enough to disable). I would rather go through those 5 hours of labor each month than have 6 days of migraines. First, at the end of labor you get a baby (not that I want a baby each month, but you get the idea). Migraines have No Reason. Second, labor has a beginning and an end. Five hours is really not that long to deal with discomfort. Four days of a migraine is a long time. Not only do I Not Have Time for it, it really sucks!

According to the World Health Organization, migraines are a disabling illness. “WHO ranks Migraine as one of the top twenty causes of years of healthy life lost to disability.” National Migraine Association. And, all those migraine medications don’t work — for me they just give me weird side effects (like anxiety) and only take the edge off the pain (and do nothing for my nausea, tolerance for light, sound or smells).

For now I will just medicate myself with some chocolate donuts. One good side effect of migraines — I feel justified in eating anything I want.

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