What's KP Thinking?

Category: self

• Covid Drove Me Inside…In More Ways Than One.

  Posted at 4:44 pm by kpodulka, on August 11, 2020

  

  We’re now 5 months into the pandemic, and I’m taking stock. What has this time taught me? What has it brought out in me? How has it changed me? Is it even possible to be the same person on the other side of this thing? Let’s explore.

  Inside My Home

  Back in March, we were all told to go inside and stay inside for our own safety. At first it felt scary, but necessary. My family and I played puzzles, baked bread, hoarded toilet paper and Clorox, and downloaded Zoom. I found it almost a relief to take pause…to have an excuse to forgo all previous obligations. I could stop going to the gym, stop taking the kids to school and sports, stop going to dentist and ortho appointments, stop wearing makeup, bras, (anything other than pajamas really), stop going crazy with my over scheduled, overwhelming life. It was novel, almost cozy. And we all knew it would be over soon and we’d be back to “normal”.

  Next came April. And I thought “OK, let’s power thru this month, and we’ll be in the clear.” I stayed hunkered down while sewing masks, donating to Feedingmerica.org, re-posting memes, and chuckling as my favorite late night TV hosts filmed from their living rooms. I was still planning our summer vacations, and booking kids in camps, because no way this thing was gonna last thru summer.

  While the kids were in “Zoom school”, and my hubby worked from home all day, I starting finding my own online classes to take. Why not? Something to do beyond baking bread. I choose ones that looked interesting, like “Emotional Freedom Technique for Reducing Anxiety”, “How to Use a Pendulum for Answers”, “Honing Your Intuition”, and “Reiki Energy Healing”. I downloaded an online course called “You Can Heal Your Life” and watched videos by leaders in the field of spirituality and consciousness. I scheduled readings with an astrologer and a psychic. I joined an amazing women’s group called “Wake Up With Your Inner Goddess“. I had no master plan. I was exploring. Led only by my curiosity to learn new things. I was having fun while staying inside my home.

  Inside My Head

  Then May. We were still shelter in place, still inside our homes. But now I also found myself inside my head asking constant questions that had no answers. Why were cases of the virus going up, not down? Why were there so many deaths? Why were people choosing not to wear masks? Why was the U.S. not getting a handle on this thing? Who was in charge? Am I really living thru a global pandemic?? What the actual fuck was going on??? Was I supposed to be cancelling my summer plans?? Was this for real?? This virus was supposed to be gone by now—where’s the “back to normal” I was promised???

  School ended the year online, with no grades. No graduations. Sports were canceled. My husband brought home a full size monitor, ergonomic chair, and printer/scanner to embellish his home office (and by office I mean the tiny space in our bedroom located directly between the bed and dresser.) He was no longer working from home–he was now living at work.

  I was also still taking classes online and expanding my knowledge of energy work, angelic realms, past lives, metaphysics, meditation, and quantum healing. I learned new words like “Kundalini”, “Akashic Records”, “Ayurveda”, “Shamanic” and “Lightworker” to name a few. I read these books:

  • A Return To Love: Reflections on the Principles of “A Course in Miracles”
  • Mary Magdalene Revealed: The First Apostle, Her Feminist Gospel & the Christianity We Haven’t Tried Yet
  • Raising Your Vibration: 111 Practices to Increase Your Spiritual Connection
  • Welcoming the Unwelcome: Wholehearted Living in a Brokenhearted World
  • Why Are You Sick? Practical Tools for Wellness
  • Essential Oils as Natural Remedies: The Complete A-Z Reference of Essential Oils for Health and Healing
  • The Crystal Bible
  • The Women’s Wheel of Life
  • Ayurveda Beginners Guide: Essential Ayurvedic Principles and Practices to Balance and Heal Naturally
  • The Only Astrology Book You’ll Ever Need

  I found myself studying these books and videos as if it were required of me. Like I was preparing for some final exam. I made a binder with printouts, took notes, and journaled. I meditated daily. I attended New Moon and Full Moon ceremonies online each month. I created an inspirational bulletin board, bought crystals, purchased more oracle decks, and started making my own essential oil sprays. The whole time quenching my thirst for this knowledge, feeding my craving for understanding, furthering my insistence that the questions in my head must have answers somewhere…

  Next came June. It was officially summer and we were still officially screwed as a country. It was chaos. Some states reopened, some had never closed. Some required masks, some had protests about not wearing masks. One weekend beaches were open, the next they were closed. Some restaurants were open for outdoor seating only, others were packed with people eating and drinking. Some people believed scientists, others believed the President. The constant confusion, concern and unrest was fogging my brain. The more I tried to think of solutions the more perplexed I became.

  I cancelled all summer plans. No annual camping trip with our friends from Oregon, no annual trip back to Michigan to see family, no road trip to Yellowstone National Park. I also cancelled the kid’s camps and our community pool membership. My city cancelled all of it’s summer plans as well…no July 4th Festival, no Concerts in the Park, no May Fete parade. Summer 2020 was a complete bust.

  Since my calendar was now completely clear, I signed up to be certified in Reiki Energy Healing. I really didn’t give it much forethought–it was automatic in some way. The classes felt more like “remembering” than “learning”. The Reiki principles spoke directly to my heart. After completing levels 1 & 2 of Reiki certification, I knew energy healing was my path forward. It’s true that through chaos comes transformation, and I had found a way to transform my questions into answers. Without really knowing what I had been searching for since March, I had found energy healing. Or rather…energy healing had found me.

  Inside My Soul

  Throughout July I practiced Reiki Energy Healing on anyone and everyone who would let me…friends, neighbors, family, my cat, plants. And like the Universal Law says, the more I gave, the more I received. I received messages from my guides, my intuition heightened, I connected with spirits who had passed on, I made peace with my inner child. I literally manifested and experienced magic every single day. I had never felt so “in the flow” of life before. Everything felt effortless. So how was I doing all of this? What was I doing differently?

  What I learned is that I didn’t “do” anything. In fact, I stopped “doing”, and started “being”. I took the time confined in my house and stuck in my head, and used it to go into my soul. It wasn’t easy. At times I wanted to quit. Wasn’t my “unenlightened life” so much easier?? But I found that once I woke up, it was impossible to go back to sleep. Though I couldn’t literally travel during this time, I could travel into the depths of my soul thru meditations, shamanic journeys, and past life regressions. I let go. I gave up control. I let the universe unfold at will. I stopped searching for answers outwardly, and instead looked inward. And guess what? All the answers were right there within me all along. I learned the only real life lesson there is: we are pure light and love. That’s all there is. Everything else is an illusion.

  It’s now August. Covid rages on. There’s no end in sight. School’s about to begin again…online. We’re only half way thru 2020, which feels both too short and too long to be true. Days of the week are irrelevant. I’m letting my natural hair color grow in for the first time since high school. I stopped shaving my everything. My husband has a full beard. My kids now play video games 400 hours a day. The cat cannot figure out why we’re always home. I want all new furniture. The dishes are never ending. I miss my friends. I miss hugs.

  But we’ve made it this far. We can and will get thru this historic pandemic. Because, really, what choice do we have? So if you need me, you’ll find me deep inside my soul, sending light & love to the whole world, and practicing Reiki on anyone and everyone who will let me. See ya on the other side!

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  Posted in advice, life, love, self, soul, spirituality, Spirituality, Work Life Balance | 1 Comment

• The Fall That Woke Me

  Posted at 6:41 pm by kpodulka, on May 22, 2020

  What could have undone me, actually put me back together again. This is the story of the fall that woke me.

  I fell down, yet rose up.

  I was broken, yet made whole.

  I was still, yet moved like never before.

  I was confused, yet clarity came forth.

  I mourned what was lost, yet abundance was abound.

  I was hurting on the outside, yet healing on the inside.

  I slept all the time, yet was awake for the first time.

  I was alone, yet found solace in my own company.

  My bones were weak, yet my soul was strong.

  Ten days after my 40th birthday, I fell and shattered my left shin and ankle. It was an early Friday morning in late April 2015, and my friend and I were walking through the mall, chatting and catching up. We had just come from Starbucks, and were both holding a steaming hot cup of coffee. I was dressed for work in a cobalt blue sheath dress and super cute just-from-the-box 3-inch wedge sandals. The mall was practically empty, and eerily quiet as no stores were yet open.

  Then it happened. One minute I was walking, talking, sipping my coffee, the next minute I was flung forward, hurling my coffee in front of me, landing face first onto the floor of the mall. I didn’t slip. Didn’t trip. Didn’t stumble. Didn’t lose my footing. No one bumped into me. I literally went from being upright to being sprawled on the floor in the blink of an eye.

  The pain was immediate, intense, and all encompassing. I knew instantly that I couldn’t stand up–didn’t even attempt to. I started screaming “FUUUUUUUUUCK!!!!!!” at the top of my lungs. Repeatedly. Loudly. I could hear my fucks echoing through the empty mall corridors. As I lie there in excruciating pain, I fluctuated between feeling like I was going to vomit, and feeling like I was going to black out. I remember the fucks flying out of my mouth uncontrollably. I started apologizing to no one in particular for my vulgarity, but could not stop screaming obscenities. (Side note: I later read that “swearing activates the so-called ‘fight or flight’ response, leading to a surge of adrenaline and a subsequent pain relieving effect on our immune system.” #justified)

  As I was laid out flat on my stomach screaming, a face suddenly appeared in front of mine. It was a teenage girl, a complete stranger, who squatted down next to me and started talking to me in the most soothing, assuring voice. “You’re OK. We’re calling an ambulance. You’re OK.” I could see her mom (I assumed), my friend, and mall security in the background. She took my hand and started asking me questions. “What do you do for a living?” I answered, stammering, still swearing and swallowing vomit, “marketing”. She continued to talk to me, listen to my fucks, and reassure me. To this day I wish I knew her name. I would call her and thank her. I’d thank this young empathetic, beautiful stranger for holding my hand, staying with me, sharing my pain, and enduring my profanity. She was my angel of fucks.

  The paramedics arrived and two complete hotties flipped me over on my back and lifted me onto a gurney. That’s when I saw my ankle for the first time. Sideways. It was leaning sideways in a way that can only be described as…unnatural. I immediately demanded drugs. My screams of swears turned to screams of “MORPHINE! GIVE ME MORPHINE! I KNOW YOU HAVE IT!” Hottie #1 told me they had to check my vitals before they could administer any drugs. This did not shut me up. Once inside the ambulance, my friend called my husband to tell him what happened, and where to meet us at the hospital. Once we got to the hospital and I got my morphine, I had my friend take a photo. As one does. #priorities

  

  The next few hours were a blur (see above paragraph regarding morphine). My friend left, my husband arrived, xrays were taken, and it seemed like a million different doctors and nurses came and went. I do remember one nurse who came in, looked at my xrays, and said “My God, your leg and ankle are crushed. Were you in a car accident?”. To which I replied, “No. I was drinking coffee at the mall.”

  The hospital sent me home that day, because the swelling was too sever to operate. That car ride home was hell. Every bounce, bump, and shake sent a jolt of lightening pain through me. My left shin and ankle were a bag of loose bones wrapped up to reduce swelling. I waited a week on my couch, heavily sedated, before having reconstructive surgery to put me back together again.

  

  I spent the next 11 months either on bed rest, on a scooter, on crutches, in a boot or in physical therapy learning to walk again. Then one evening in March 2016, not quite a year since my break, I was reaching up to put a glass away in a high cupboard, and I twisted my left ankle funny. And by funny, I mean I fucking re-broke the damn thing. That same week I was back in surgery for the second time in a year. I was devastated physically, mentally, and emotionally. Back to square one. Another year of recovery and learning to walk again. Another year on the couch.

  And yet…

  

  Looking back now on that time in my life, I see what happened to me in a new, shinier light. For all the time I spent physically recovering, I also spent spiritually awakening. As my ankle was healing, so was my soul.

  I meditated for the first time, and joined a “New Moon Women’s Circle”. I found an energy healer (5 doors down from me!) who taught me about chakras, family constellations, and color therapy. I started watching the news, and caring about world events. I followed politics, learned to protest and advocate for equality. I attended the first Women’s March in Washington D.C. which was a down-right religious experience. I enrolled in my first self-help class called “The Unstoppable Program” which taught me how to be kind to myself and reclaim sparkle and joy in my life. I read a book that forever changed the way I see my parents and learned to set boundaries. I discovered the Enneagram and how to both acknowledge and work through my deepest fears. Oh, and I quit my career in soul-crushing corporate America after 20 years. Literally just left my badge and laptop on my desk and walked out forever. I started saying yes to life, and no to anxiety, guilt, silence, and staying small.

  Not that any of this was easy. The stuff that changes us at our core rarely is. My marriage hit a turning point, I lost a lot of friends, and I gained 60 pounds. Nothing in my life looks the same since I fell. It looks different. But that’s what happens when the light shifts, doesn’t it? Shadows disappear and things are clearer. I believe the Universe had to knock me over so I could stand back up. Stronger, spiritual, and shining love.

  

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  Posted in Equal Rights, feminism, life, love, poem, self, soul, Spirituality | 2 Comments | Tagged Corporate America, enneagram, feminism, injury, meditation, self help, self love, soul, soul searching, spirituality, trauma, wellness

• Peace Be With You

  Posted at 1:00 pm by kpodulka, on August 11, 2018

  

  We’ve lost the ability to be quiet. There’s noise everywhere. A constant hum of distraction. It’s more than just the sounds of traffic, pings from our devises, TVs in the background, radios in the car, undertones of conversations in restaurants…it’s literally a buzz in our brains. There’s no off-button for the constant barrage of information flung at us every moment of every day…no mute button, no silent mode. And it’s breaking us as humans. I dare say as a collective society the noise is making us overwhelmed, anxious and angry.

  Daydreaming has been replaced with brainstorming. To be caught daydreaming or “with your head in the clouds” is considered a waste of time. It’s no longer acceptable to let your mind wander just to see where it takes you. It must have a purpose, a problem that you’re solving, a new idea that you’re creating.

  A walk in nature is now for exercise. It’s to burn calories, get steps on a fitness tracker, hold a “walking-meeting” or “working-lunch”. It’s to train for a half-marathon. We wear headphones plugged into audio books, music, podcasts, or phone calls. No more walks alone just listening to the birds, wind, and trees.

  Alone time is considered selfish, lazy, or a luxury. We have to schedule time to relax, and make excuses to prove we’ve earned it–we have to be so totally burnt out and “in-desperate need” of quiet time that it’s acceptable.

  Vacations are either not taken, or as much work as normal life. Vacations are jammed-packed with activities, sightseeing, and tourist attractions. Plus most of us still check-in with the office from a so-called-vacation. Which, by definition, is work, not vacation.

  So here’s my idea: Let’s go on a quest for quiet…for true peace of mind…for slow, free-flowing thoughts with no agenda. No interruptions. No goals. Let’s wander thru the woods and listen. Let’s sit under a tree and watch the leaves sway. Let’s pick the blades of grass and feel them tickle our toes. Let’s contemplate, soul search, reflect. Let’s stare at the ocean and feel its rhythm in our blood. Lets turn off the TVs, devices, podcasts, music. Let’s hum to ourselves. Make our own music. Let’s listen to our breathing, close our eyes, and sink into ourselves. Let’s tap into our internal peace and quiet. Turn off our hamster-wheel brains. Make no excuses for our silence and solitude. Just be alone in our own skin. To do this is human. To deny this is to deny our own humanity.

  Peace out.

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  Posted in advice, life, self, soul, Work Life Balance | 1 Comment | Tagged advice, balance, believe, meditation, relax, soul

• Inside Out

  Posted at 9:40 am by kpodulka, on May 17, 2018

  

  My shield has cracked,

  My heart has split.

  Real is seeping out.

  Quick! Should I clean it up?

  What if it makes a mess?

  Yes…what if?

  But it’s my mess! Aren’t I the only one who can clean it?

  Isn’t it just easier to not make the mess in the first place? Keep it all in, neat and tidy?

  But it’s too late for that.

  My walls are leaking.

  Real is seeping.

  Once it starts to ooze, it can’t be forced back it.

  It’s so unruly.

  So, I guess for now you’ll see my mess.

  What’s that you say?

  You have your own mess too?

  Everyone does?

  oh.

  My mask is shattered.

  The floodgates are open.

  Real is seeping out.

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  Posted in advice, life, love, poem, self, soul | 2 Comments | Tagged inner beauty, inner strength, self love, soul, soul searching

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• Recent Ramblings

  • Covid Drove Me Inside…In More Ways Than One. August 11, 2020
  • FOMO is real and it might just kill us all. August 4, 2020
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