Last Friday I had the privilege of sharing a virtual stage with Freebo, who used to play bass with Bonnie Raitt, and Janni Littlepage, who used to sing with Loggins and Messina.  I had to talk to myself the whole time, “Vicki, this isn’t about comparing. Remember, comparison is a little murder. Show up and sing.” So I showed up and sang.  I sang the song I am offering you in this newsletter because my dear friend and platinum songwriter/singer/keynote concertarian Jana Stanfield, likes it the best of all the songs of mine she has heard.

After the concert, I got some requests for the song and the lyrics. Graduation and Mother’s Day are perfect opportunities to say and sing well done, so I am giving this song to you this week in hopes you will sing it to yourself and others.

Note: I will have another Concert Window fun time with Deb Gauldin on May 22nd.  She nourishes people with her songs and stories and makes us all laugh..  I will get back to you with details as soon as I know them.

Let people know you love them. Do not wait until they are worthy. Do not wait until you have worked out all the kinks with them. Just say “I love you and thank you for all you have done for me.”

Here is the song to share  Well Done.  An excerpt from my book Woman with a Voice follows.

“I wrote this song as I was listening to keynote speaker Margarita Suarez at an Oregon Counseling Association conference. She encouraged all of us to jump off that cliff of safety and live our lives more fully. As a therapist for over thirty years, she told us that, in her opinion, the single most limiting factor in people’s lives is having never heard “well done.” She said men especially need to hear “well done, son.”

As soon as I heard these words, my inner Muse said, “That is a song!” I started writing, and at the end of the conference, as I had the group in a circle for the closing song (“It Takes a Whole Village” from my CD Alive, Alive) I heard my Muse again say, “Sing the song!” 

“But I have not even sung it out loud to myself yet!” I protested. “Sing the song!” my Muse insisted, and so I did. After the conference, two women came up and asked me for the words to the first verse, which was all I had completed at the time. I got a note from one of the women later, telling me she had calligraphed the words, framed them, and given them to her son for his birthday.

I have sung this song at baccalaureates and at almost every presentation I have made for the last several years. A friend played it at her mother’s funeral. One high school class calligraphied the song for Mother’s Day. It is a simple song with a simple message, and it often makes people cry. I can hear Willie Nelson singing it, and I’m hoping he will want to record it. If you know him, will you ask him?”

Let your love spill from your mouth and body all day long

A good friend asked me recently, “Do you ever get overwhelmed?”  I thought for a moment, No, I don’t.  Not very often anyway.”

Almost everyone I know struggles with feeling overwhelmed:  artists, teachers, architects, engineers.  How have I managed to escape this condition of our times?

Luck and a giant penny.

I started undermining overwhelm in my life almost 40 years ago (40 years! Yikes!) when I was a high school English teacher.

One morning, on my way back from getting my mail out of my teacher’s mailbox, I suddenly saw myself scurrying down the hall. The students were languishing against the lockers, sometimes in mutual anatomical exploration that should have received a “Get a room!’ recommendation, when, as if I were hovering over my body in an operating room, I saw myself as a rational observer might.

I have a slightly crazed look on my face, compounded by the set of keys protruding from my mouth.   I’m on my way to get back to my room and get ready for the onslaught of students,  33 strong slightly surly, hormone-bedeviled teenagers, who will descend upon my classroom in mere minutes.

Suddenly, a rather large penny dropped out of the heavens and onto my head and woke me up.  Why was I in such a hurry?  My students certainly weren’t.  How much time would this fretting and fussing save me?  Two minutes?  Less?

I stopped my near run and started walking slowly, not quite a meander, but close.

I’ve been “meandering” ever since–as I’ve won teaching awards, traveled all over the world, written several books, recorded 4 CD’s, and earned a Master’s Degree.

I say all this to prove that overwhelming ourselves does not make us more productive.  The brain research shows just the opposite.  We cannot multitask well.  We can do two or more things poorly at the same time, while we increase our blood pressure and decrease the effectiveness of our immune system.

Want Some Help Undermining Your Overwhelm?

Pennies can turn into boulders if we aren’t careful.

I’m pronouncing myself as an expert at undermining overwhelm.  I’m offering a free consult to the first five people who contact me.  I guarantee you will get at least one great idea or your money back!  Warning:  Do not put this on your To Do list.  If you suspect I could help you, hit reply right now.  We’ll set up a 30 minute session, less if you like.

If you are too overwhelmed to spend a little time with me, here is a short audio on one idea on how to Tame Your To Do List.  Click here.

Listen to your body.  It never lies to you.

My eye disease comes from a rare genetic disorder. In fact, they can trace the gene mutation back to a family in Ireland. When my mother went blind at age 40, the disease was so rare it was misdiagnosed, and we were told it was not inheritable.

In my mid-30s I started having trouble seeing at night. Then things really got weird. While on a camping trip I looked at my coffee cup and it was no longer round. It looked as if Salvador Dali touched my cup and warped it with his cubist wand.

This began a five-year adventure of laser surgeries, lost vision, terror, divorce, and job loss. And then, one day I woke up and I could no longer read and drive.  My central vision left without leaving so much as a note, which I would not have been able to read anyway.

The journey from that day 20 years ago to this day has been transformative. I’ve learned to ask for help, surrender, and be grateful for what I have, instead of yearning  for what I’ve lost.  I now practice savoring each moment. Going blind set me on a rich spiritual path- One that still chills me to the bone occasionally, such as when I lose all my sight in one eye, even for a moment.

Before my mother died 10 years ago, her vision had worsened until she could barely see. She took prednisone because her carotid arteries were blocked and occasionally, get ready, she would lose total sight. Her biggest fear as she approached her death, was not the pain of bone cancer, or the exhaustion of trying to breathe due to emphysema. Her biggest fear was going completely blind.

I’m calling the doctor on Monday. I don’t want to call the doctor.  I do not want to have to arrange the trip to the doctor, or have to sit in the waiting room.   I don’t want to take steroids.  I do not want to take more tests, expensive tests. But more than that, I do not want to go blind because I’m too stubborn to find out what’s true.

Saying yes to what is

This is an example of being willing to say yes to what is. Or rather, saying yes to what might be. I must be willing, and you must be willing, to face the truth of what is happening. If we avoid the truth of what is happening, we cannot take action to free ourselves or to correct anything that’s gone awry in our lives.

I’m sharing about my temporary blindness because I almost didn’t tell my husband about it. I wanted to pretend that it didn’t happen and crawl under the house so to speak. But what I couldn’t forget, what dogged my thoughts, was the fear that I might be having a stroke. It scared me enough to go to the bathroom and take extra aspirin.

If you’re taking extra aspirin because you think you might have had a stroke, I think it’s a good idea to see a doctor. Even if you’re afraid you can’t hear really bad news.

What about You?

If you are still reading this story, and you are having any thoughts tingling in your brain, it could be a sign you are avoiding something you need to face. The sooner you say yes to what is, the sooner you’ll be free. The more you practice saying yes to what is, the better you get at it.

 I’ll let you know what the doctor says in my next newsletter. Let me know if I can help you face anything that’s scaring you.

Follow your bliss or it will stalk you,

Vicki Hannah Lein

PS.  The first song I wrote after I lost my central vision was “Gratitude.”  It reminds me to be grateful for what I’ve got instead of yearning after what I’ve lost.  May the song remind you to do the same.

Click here. 

First, I want to welcome all new members to this community. My intention is that every newsletter I send out makes you laugh, makes you think, and invites you to take action.

If you are having trouble finding your best in any situation in your life, reply to this e-mail for a free consultation. Any feedback you give me is a great gift, truly. Is there any issue you would like me to address?  Write a song about?

Post Valentine’s Day Massacre

Yikes!  Valentine’s Day can really set us up for failure.  My husband and I give each other the gift of celebrating Valentine’s Day every day, this takes off the pressure.

The Featured Article this month is a story of how I shifted from wanting to smack my beloved husband into wanting to smooch him instead. If you wish to print this story out, download this pdf. Otherwise… I hope you enjoy it.

Murray and the Ketchup Or When Attention Deficit Disorder Collides with Blindness

Excerpt from Woman with a voice:  Daring to Live Authentically Ever After by Vicki Hannah Lein

Because of my vision problems, Murray and I decided to organize the refrigerator in a way that would help me find things. The leftovers would go on the top shelf, milk and other large items on the second shelf, and so on.Murray readily agreed to this plan. He is an occupational therapist,after all, and he knows about making accommodations to help people perform necessary tasks, such as feeding yourself from the refrigerator. So why did the ketchup, among other things, keep getting moved?

“How thoughtless he is,” I said to myself. “How incredible, especially since he is a professional!” I fumed. “Does he hate me?” I wondered. “Does he have any idea how difficult it is to live with low vision? This is such a simple thing for him to do, and it makes a big difference to me. If he really loved me, the ketchup would stay put.”

We reviewed our plan. Murray again agreed that keeping things in the same place in the refrigerator was a reasonable request, and he should honor it. Yet the ketchup moved again, and I thought, “I hate him!” Well, I did not exactly hate him, but I was confused and hurt,and no matter how many times I confronted him, the ketchup still wandered the shelves of the refrigerator.

And then I thought of a new story: “Murray doesn’t hate me. I know he doesn’t hate me. He has attention deficit, is easily bored, and I’ll bet he is just projecting his boredom onto the ketchup. He thinks the ketchup bottle gets restless, so he moves it.”

Now this version is probably more true than the “He hates me” story I told myself, but that isn’t important. What is important is that changing my story changed how I felt about this continual problem. Instead of being angry and hurt, I laughed. It became a joke, and (here is the interesting part) the ketchup has stayed put ever since I shared my new story about why the ketchup was roving the refrigerator with the “culprit.”  Maybe Murray’s memory works better when it is bathed in love rather than irritation.

Your Turn
What little things could you do to love your sweetie better: bring her coffee in the morning? Hang up his clothes? Thank him for taking out the garbage? Tell him you are committed to being a better listener, not interrupt with solutions? Just come up to her and start rubbing her neck? Rub her feet every single day? (I promise, you will never hear, “Not tonight,honey. I have a headache.”) 
There’s a lot more where that came from in my book Woman with a Voice: Daring to live Authentically Ever After. 
It’s available on Kindle from Amazon, and, great news, you do not need a Kindle to read it!