Changing Your Grip

This has been one of those weeks.

It’s reminded me of one of my favorite “change my grip” tools : One shot at a time. One day at a time.

This is a tool of survival. And it’s especially important when the chips are down. Recessions. Missing cuts. Uncertainty. Illness. (I’m fine, by the way — but there have been times when I’ve gone through vulnerable, scary periods of healing from major surgeries, or the illnesses of loved ones.)

Some days the future can look like a dense fog. The questions start rolling  in: How will I? What IF? What should I do?

Even the bravest of us can succumb to those feelings of fear, uncertainty, and the idea we’re alone in our decisions.

Certainly I felt scared once I was alone with a traveling husband and little boys who depended on me for everything that was safe and secure.  That’s when I learned the value in taking it one day at a time. Sometimes, on the days when it hit 5pm and everyone else’s husbands in my neighborhood were arriving home from work, while mine was 500, 1,000 or 3,000 miles away — no relief in sight from four children wound up and wrestling/needy or crying — I took it all one HOUR at a time.

After years and years of practice, I’m able to pull myself out of whatever is causing me anxiety and focus on today.

What can I do right now? What action can I take? What can’t be done — what needs to be let go of for now?

What small thing can I notice or do that is positive?

Yesterday I decided to take my 7 month old puppy, Brit, up the street to the old VA hospital golf course for a run.  The golf course was a par 3 course that was pretty popular with the veterans who played there. But a few years ago, at a time when the Bush administration was planning to close this VA hospital down (and the community was rallying behind it — a major center for the treatment of PTSD and substance abuse) — they decided to cut out the golf course.

(You know — does that make a lot of sense? Cut out something that helped the vets enjoy something?)

Anyway — I took Brit up for the first time. It was the first time he was able to run free off leash. The old course is fenced. Not a soul was around. I needed to work with Brit on “Come (Back) “. Always a dicey moment with a puppy… what would he do, after being at the end of a leash on a sidewalk since I brought him home?

By the way — Brit is a black Lab.

Once we got into the course a bit, I let him off the 20′ training lead. It took about a minute for him to realize — Oh, the pure joy he had! Running. Smelling! Ears flopping, tongue lolling, he raced around and then doubled back to me, ran off a few yards, looked back at me — yes!

Every so often I would call him to me, and he’d come running and go into a perfect sit. Treat time! Then off again. Over and over.

We walked for a long time. The sun was shining, the sky was blue and it was brisk but not cold. The ground was spongy with the snowmelt. I tried to make out — what was that? A tee box? A raised green? Sand was piled in a spot with gravel and other pieces of cement and remnants of things that were on the course once. The grass has grown so long, bleached out by winter, that it looked like the blonde hair of a woman lying in waves.

I love golf courses. This one’s going back to the crickets and the deer and to dogs who get a chance to run and be dogs for a while.

One shot at a time. One step at a time. One hole at a time… Take the time to breathe and BE.

I did, and it helped. As always.