October 6 2009 – Tip #200

Today
is Focusing Tip #200… and it's also my 60th birthday. Which makes me
want to reflect on life's special milestones and how Focusing can be so
very empowering, especially when we want to go for our own uniqueness
and go past cultural assumptions and norms.

I can pause and get a felt sense of me at 60…

…and
the first thing I sense is wonderment, and an image of a blank slate.
There are no expectations that I ever had for being 60 that fit how I
feel right now! It feels like I'm "off the charts," moving outside
known territory.

There is an inner sense of excitement,
adventure… And a smile as the words come: "If there are no rules for
how to be 60, that means I can create it myself!"

I realize that
when I was growing up, I looked all around me to try to understand how
I was "supposed" to be. In my small midwestern town, there seemed to be
patterns and norms for every age and gender.

There's
something that Barbara McGavin and I realized as we were teaching
Treasure Maps to the Soul last week. When you're Self-in-Presence, not
knowing isn't scary.

From Self-in-Presence, we can feel the known and the not-known, and both are OK.

I'm
feeling this "how it feels to be 60" felt sense, and it feel like
"having climbed." Not knowing how much more there is to the climb, or
when it levels off, or starts to head downward. Exhilaration, is the
feeling.

As for what the specifics are, I don't have to know. I
don't need rules or norms or guidelines. I have friends… and my inner
sense of rightness.