Warped Math

On the drive home from Delaware six years ago, after attending my Dad's funeral, I developed a theory. I took the age of each of my parents, when they died, and calculated the average. Then I decided, this number represents my personal lifespan.

My husband didn't like how the math worked out, so he immediately discarded the hypothesis. Insistent creature that I am, I chose a new method for averaging. I took my parents, grandparents, and aunts and uncles related by blood (it's easy, because nearly everyone is already dead). Calculated my new expiration date...and came up with the exact same answer.

In November, I'll turn 50. Based on my high tech mathematical speculation, I've got 11 years left. Remember, though, I came up with this six years ago, so I started with 17 years.

If you've ever had a conversation with me about each person's unique gifts, you'll know that mine are NOT number related - not ever. When feeling under the gun, I never reach for statistics and percentages to work my way to safety. Some do! And I applaud that gift. It's just never been one of mine.

So, knowing that numbers aren't really my thing, perhaps you'll find my premise to be faulty. Or maybe this theory doesn't fit for you for other reasons. That's okay, you can live as long as you want. For me, though, holding the notion that I have this limited time, encourages me to nudge the comfort zone of my life. To clarify, my motivation is free of fear (at least so far). I've simply been using this catalyst as a way of living into my remaining years abundantly.

Here's a smattering of how I've been doing that:

I got my first-ever stamp in my passport (St. Maarten), and have since been out of the country at least 12 additional times. My destinations have included Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, South Africa, Italy, Australia, and Martinique (maybe more?). Getting to and from Australia, I literally circled the globe - how cool is that? While traveling alone in Cape Town, I drove on the other side of the road for the first time...wait for it...in a standard shift car, so yes, this means shifting with the left hand. I discovered the hardest part was distinguishing the turn signal from the windshield wipers. I filled my car with laughter, as I made the same mistake again and again.

In 2015, I spent a combination of nights, totaling three full months, in a bed away from my home, My activities ranged from personal holidays, leading retreats, or participating in out-of-town workshops. With those experiences, I decimated my belief of what I thought I "should" be doing - you know, working hard every day, and squeezing in the occasional vacation.

I also stopped working "hard," because suffering no longer fits in my vision of success. I don't even mean that I'm working "smart." I'm speaking of a kind of delight, love, and gratitude I feel for the work I'm called and permitted to do. In fact, in this span of six years, I facilitated a variety of workshops, alone, and with others. I led four retreats (5th is happening right now). And with my travel-rejuvenated energy (and letting go of things that no longer worked for me), my one-to-one client practice quadrupled. This ability to serve more people truly lights me up. Different, but similar to traveling, it feeds my soul and expands my view points.

I've created space, and allowed change. For example, I closed The Consciousness Collaborative; I ended my long-term assistant role in another practitioner's workshops; I eliminated relationships with people who drained me or asked me to trust them more than I trust myself; the relationships I've kept have morphed, so that I am more me than I've ever been before, and I generally experience the arc of interactions with a sense of balance.

My support team continues to contract, shift, and expand, in alignment with where I am. Over these years, I widened the bandwidth of those I learn from, and stopped working with practitioners that no longer meet my needs. Even if I cannot point to something specific being "wrong," if I recognize a lack of vibrational resonance, I know that even if we fit once, that's not true now. In some cases, with time, we match up again, because it's a moment to moment proposition. This flow allowed room for new practitioners, with different modalities, to enter and exit for my healing and personal growth. Similarly, I participated in workshops with Brian Weiss, Iyanla Vanzant, and Katie and Gay Hendricks, to augment my milieu again and again.

With my husband, I've collaborated to reduce our debt to only the essentials (mortgage and car loan). If the trend continues, we'll be debt-free in fewer than nine years - woo hoo! Within this window, we sold a small rental property and changed our residence from a condominium to a single family home. I also upgraded my ride to (my version of) the cutest car in any parking lot. Because, if I've only got a limited window of driving time, I'd like it to be fun!

I love that my relationship with my husband is better now than it's ever been. Is there more work to do - YES! And, we're navigating those paths of expansion each day. One of the things that has changed in these last years is our time apart. We have spent more time away from each other in the last six years, than the prior 19 combined - by far! I believe this space, and the experiences we have individually, enrich our marriage when we come back together. We also consciously choose to spend time together expanding our respective comfort zones (whether this takes the form of a workshop we both attend, a travel adventure, or even a new restaurant). So, it's a win-win.

While there is always, ALWAYS more room for growth in all aspects of my life, I'm going for it! Because I think my crazy math opened that notion of "live each day like it's your last" with a kind of concrete reality. It's entirely possible I'll kick the bucket tomorrow. I also allow for the possibility that I'll live another 30 years; however, I'm not waiting for "someday" to live my life the way I want to live it.

One of my clients commented to me last year, "Wow, Joanne, you're really living your life right now, aren't you? You're not waiting for anything." In some respects, she's got it exactly right.

However, like all humans, I've still got all kinds of baggage. I eat more than I need. I hate going to social functions more now than ever. And I still waste time on computer games. Yet, without my warped and fictional death deadline, I believe I'd still be waiting for "some day" to...find a great private yoga instructor; raft down the Grand Canyon (and learn how much I appreciate plumbing); and talk to my husband about things that really matter to me, instead of NOT speaking to him for months on end. I also wonder, if I were not at peace with my math, if I would have been conscious of the preciousness of the time I had with my cats who have died in these past few years - appreciating them while they were with me (instead of only after they were gone). I can't know any of this to be true, but I think the strategy works for me, so I'll keep going with it, until that changes.

As I said, I'm not here to tell you how long you're going to live (based on my highly evolved mathematical equation). I do wonder, though, how often do you put off what you want? Or shy away from a stretch, because "now's not the time?" What might your life be like, if you lived into the things that truly matter to you - EVERY DAY? I know, for me, although I've written my choices in a lump, this list was comprised of one small decision at a time. I called upon my courage a million times since that drive home from Delaware, and I hope to report that I've multiplied that number by a gazillion by the time I make my way to the exit. We'll see!

With love and warped math,
Joanne Lutz