Incredible Lightness of Being

As mentioned previously, I tend to write to process my thoughts/emotions.  As I flounder trying to work out what I think, how to proceed in this life, I have shared (overshared, some might say) my process.

Well, I'm about as 'done' as done can be.  I am now into the official closing of my business.  It will take some time to take care of the details.  One does not build a business over 40+ years and shut it down in a couple of days.  Or, at least, I don't.  There are still things to deal with, things that need to be done, things that have to happen before the door officially closes on Laura Fry Weaving Studio as an official entity.

One of the reasons I went to Art Market was to say goodbye to some of the people I've become friendly with and who I will no longer see, because the only time I saw them was doing craft fairs.  Some of the people I wanted to talk to were not there, but I did manage some goodbyes, and that felt good.

I had posted my "Farewell" statement in my booth and several exhibitors talked to me about the fact I was retiring from the business.  Almost all of them asked how I felt about it.  Those in my age bracket shook my hand and congratulated me.  :)

If you are a regular reader, you will know that I did struggle with the decision, in large part because I felt it was being imposed on me.  As the weeks and months passed, it became apparent that it was the right decision.  As that realization dawned, it morphed from resentment to resignation and now to acceptance.

There is power in acceptance.  The previous stages were uncomfortable and weighty.  Acceptance means I am giving the weight of resentment away. 

During a time of heaviness about life, I sought help from a professional.  One of the ways suggested to me was to pay attention to what I was feeling but not wallow in it.  Each morning I was to set the stove timer for 15 minutes and during that time I was to write (in long hand because there were no personal computers much available then) about everything that was going through my brain.  Every random stray thought, every anxiety driven fear, every worry.  When the timer went, I was to put down my pen/pencil and for the rest of the day when those anxious thought squirrels began to rampage in my brain I was to say Stop - out loud if necessary - and then go on with my day.

At first my day was a litany of Stop, Stop, Stop, STOPSTOPSTOPSTOP to the point of tears.  But as the days passed, as I recognized and acknowledged my anxiety and fear, but then got on with what needed doing, the destructive thinking began to fade.  I began to learn the lesson of seeing my fear and anxiety, but looking to the solutions, instead of getting mired in the anxiety.

It wasn't easy.  I worked hard at it.  I still have bouts of anxiety that plague me but I can usually pull myself out of it, sometimes by the StopStopStop thinking, but usually by writing it out.

So now I am in acceptance.  I still have no idea what will come next.  With age comes wisdom, it is said, and I am old enough now to know that something will come along.  Opportunity will present itself.  It might be something I have actively sought, or it might be something completely unexpected.

I have plans for the coming year but they are tentative.  What I have done is get rid of deadlines.  Not all of them - I am deadline driven - but the 'hard' deadlines of show dates, the deadlines of needing to produce inventory to feed the craft fair circuit.  The deadlines of teaching multiple workshops for guilds, deadlines of getting travel organized and paid for - and the paying of bills, the balancing of ledgers and the collection and remittance of sales taxes.  The kinds of deadlines that can bring a boat load of repercussions if they are missed.

So retirement for me is to get rid of those kinds of business associated responsibilities.  I am choosing to have fewer deadlines.  Fewer responsibilities.  I choose to have a quieter life.  A less weighty life.

One of the discussions I had with someone was that I am choosing to 'act my age', accept that I am now an 'elder' in my community and that part of that responsibility - because I AM still alive, still capable of thinking and even weaving (although at a much slower pace, dammit, but I don't need to be as fast because I no longer have the craft fair mill to feed - see how this writing thing goes?) - that it is now my responsibility to be a resource, a mentor.

I have not read the book The Incredible Lightness of Being - but the title pretty much sums up how I am feeling about entering this next phase of my life.  Because that professional who helped me?  Asked me if I could set down my burdens and walk away.  At the time I told them I didn't know if I could.   Turns out that I know now.  And I can. 

Light.  That's how I feel.