Family & Close Relationships (2nd Base)

Second Base:  FAMILY & CLOSE PERSONAL RELATIONSHIPS

The truth is that I made the mistake of thinking I could skip 1st Base and head right to 2nd.

I was a mother, a wife, a daughter, a friend. There just weren't enough hours in the day to manage any more than taking care of others.

When my daughter started having a hard time at life (age 13), I was told that the best thing I could do for her, was to take care of myself.

Hence, the way to make it to 2nd base and have meaningful relationships with others, is to make sure you tag 1st.

RESOURCES:
Here are some valuable resources that help me when I've done all I can on 1st base, but am still stranded on 2nd:

1. "Boundaries When to Say Yes, When to Say No to Take Control of Your Life" by author's Henry/ Townsend Cloud

2. Daybreak Treatment Center for troubled adolescents (Germantown, TN)
http://daybreaktreatment.com/

3.  "Love: The Course they Forgot to Teach You in School," by Greg Godek

4.  Trina O'Quinn & Brisa Samudio (two fabulous counselors in CA)

My own world series.

"The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation,"  -Henry Thoreau

I make a lot of reference to baseball. I grew up in a baseball home.  My father coached my brother's Little League teams up until he reached high school.

In my early thirties, I found myself in San Diego near the Navy Seals training base.  I discovered an empty baseball diamond and realized that I had never ran the bases.  Why? It surely wasn't because I was girl.  It was simply that I hadn't.  I aways sat on the sidelines, keeping score and cheering like a maniac.

I decided on that foggy morning, that I wanted to try.  I didn't need to ask for permission. I didn't need to be the member of an official team.  It was just me and three bags + homeplate.

It was a liberating experience for me. I felt brave.  I felt strong.  And I felt thankful that nobody was around to see me.  I thought a lot about that day and shortly after came up with the the following sports analogy.

1st Base:  My mind, my body, my spirit.

2nd Base:  My family and important relationships.

3rd Base:  My own financial independence.

Home Plate: When I give back to others.

When I get stumped with too many things to do and I'm not sure how to prioritize...I use this analogy to put things in order:  Take care of me, take care of my family, take care of my finances, then give back to others.

1. It's an ongoing journey to discover what I need to take care of me.  Like many women, I've spent way too much time focusing on my body.  The number on the scale had the ability to make or break my day.  But, I had it wrong...I needed to focus on my mind. If all I did was look in the mirror and tell myself I was fat, I only got fatter.

2.  When I focus on my Mind and stopped judging myself, then I started to feed myself better food, get more sleep, and take better care of myself.

3.  In the South, the most often asked question is, "What church do you attend?"  I've been to many churches.  I was raised Evangelical Christian; I attended a Quaker church in high school; been the member of a Presbyterian Church; and home-churched.  For me, I finally found my spiritual home at a Unitarian Universalist Congregation in Memphis, TN.  

Some of the tools that saved me from a life of despair:

1.  Meditation

2.  Brown rice & whole foods

3.  Zumba

4.  Unitarian Universalism

Resources:

Maximum Freedom:  A Guide to Meditation (cd

The 10 Commandments to Freedom and

"Maximum Security: The True Meaning of Freedom" book by Alan Gompers

www.alangompers.com

"Eat, Pray, Love" book by Liz Gilbert

www.elizabethgilbert.com

Unitarian Universalist Association

www.uua.org

Zumba

www.zumba.com