Julianne Harvey

In Identity, Nurture, Personal Growth, Relationships

Stay the Course

Julianne HarveyJuly 12, 2016July 11, 2016Leave a comment

How we handle stress reveals us on a primal level. We have nowhere to hide when the pressure builds. Do we blow up, retreat, soothe with food, shopping, alcohol or sex, or do we face it head on with grace and calm?

Very few of us do the latter, but it’s a new goal for me. I know that the time to prepare for stress is when the seas are still, not wild with uncertainty. We prepare for hardship in the peaceful times, by developing skills that will see us through the bumps that are sure to come in the future.

Confidence is always an inside game. We are sunk if we hinge our self esteem on any outward achievement or praise, for these are fickle and will certainly fade. Our surest hedge against internal or external disaster is to stoke the fires of our belief in ourselves on a regular basis. Waiting until the stress arrives means we are too late.

I’ve been living this out lately, after a turbulent period of suffering. Those old demons that hunch on my shoulder and plague me with taunts of being less-than, not good enough and worthless have finally quieted down. I simply waited them out and in time they got bored and went on to irritate someone else.

Half of this life is just outlasting what tries to defeat us. It’s important to stay busy with other pursuits to minimize the dark forces working to pull us under.

I’m loving this season of internal calm. It’s that dewy, clean feeling after a hard rain. It’s less a triumph than a relief that this particular storm has ended and patches of blue sky are visible once again.

All I know is that it helps to do our internal work each and every day, especially when we see no obvious evidence of it. If we stay faithful to our soul, when the tough times mysteriously end we will see the benefits of this devoted attention.

If you are hurting right now, with no clear answers or insights, simply stay the course. Nourish yourself with the gentle sustaining routines. Wash your face, apply sunscreen, listen to happy music, drink water, eat your vegetables (and also chocolate). Pain doesn’t last forever. Neither does self-doubt, fear and worry. One day, you’ll wake up and feel contented, hopeful, a little bit more secure in your own brave identity.

You are likely doing better than you think you are. I say this to myself as a mantra when all seems lost. Life can be rough with many mountains to climb, but we can do it if we pack the right gear and we train for the trail so we are prepared.

Gentleness and courage are suitable bedfellows for the calm times and the terrifying ones. One day, in the very near future, you will experience a personal breakthrough. You’ll feel different, you’ll see the world in a new way, and all of that constancy in the darkness will get you to that unforeseen moment of light.

In Culture, Minimalism, Parenting

Living with Less

Julianne HarveyJuly 5, 2016July 3, 2016Leave a comment

Since February, we’ve been living with less as a family. We’ve all worked at de-owning (a step above de-cluttering) by going through every drawer, closet, cupboard and surface in our home, garage, shed and vehicles.

It feels fantastic. I’ve learned that to get at the essential, you must clear away the unnecessary. Minimizing is a process of paring down, cutting back, eliminating what you don’t need so you can better appreciate what brings you joy and freedom.

As a culture, we are inundated with physical possessions. We are told that the marks of success are material: a new car, a huge house, lots of furniture, the latest technology and gadgets, shiny toys in the garage and driveway. But everything we buy has to be paid for, maintained, stored, used. It depreciates overnight and clutters up our lives.

Getting rid of our excess possessions has brought us liberation. We did it little by little, in fifteen minute to one hour increments of time. We started with the easiest areas, like kitchen junk drawers and linen closets, then moved on to tougher things like clothes, photos, books, CDs and DVDs. By the time we got to the kitchen, it wasn’t hard to give away extra bowls, spatulas, corn cob holders, measuring cups and fancy teapots that hadn’t been touched in a decade.

If we don’t use it, we donated, sold or junked it. No more holding on, organizing and moving items “just in case”. We love The Minimalists’ 20/20 rule: if you can replace it in 20 minutes drive for $20 or less and you don’t use it regularly, get rid of it. This rule helped in moments of indecision.

We also repeatedly asked ourselves, “Would we pay to move this item?” In previous house moves, we packed up anything and everything without discriminating. Now we are intentional about what we want to bring along into any future stage of our lives. When the kids outgrow their toys, games, movies and music, it’s time to let them go, not drag them along to clutter up a new season.

Living with less also means not bringing in mountains of fresh stuff. We automatically buy less now. We practice saying “no thank you” to the free gifts we are offered in stores or at events. We attempt to purchase only what we need and use instead of impulse items we’ll later have to sort and toss.

I’ve enjoyed watching our kids absorb this minimizing mindset as well. On a recent trip we browsed in gift stores but felt no impulse to buy any items. Ava and William are now motivated to save for certain things they really desire instead of buying what’s in front of them.

I love these changes in our family. Clearing away clutter gives more meaning to what remains in your home, your life, your soul. It’s beautiful, freeing, inspiring. I’d love to hear your stories of living with less. What benefits have you experienced?

In Identity, Nurture, Personal Growth, Relationships

Help is the Sunny Side of Control

Julianne HarveyJune 28, 2016June 28, 2016Leave a comment

“No one mentioned until I was in late middle age that – horribly! – my good, helpful ideas for other grown-ups were not helpful. That my help was in fact sometimes toxic. That people needed to defend themselves from my passionate belief that I had good ideas for other people’s lives.

I did not know that help is the sunny side of control.”

This beautiful quote is from the great Anne Lamott’s Facebook page. When I read it, something vital and primal leaped to recognition in my own soul, like a light switch being turned on to illuminate a dark space.

In this life, we have to experience an idea to fully understand it. We must inhabit it by walking it out. Simply thinking through it is not enough to change us. We need to taste it, grapple with it, fight it and then eventually surrender to it.

I did not know that help is the sunny side of control. This tidy phrase encapsulates what I’ve been wrestling with for several years now. I feel like I’m finally ready to accept this bold truth: when help is mostly about me and what I want the other person to do in return, it is not actually help. It’s manipulation, expectation, control.

Learning to face ourselves honestly is a lifelong process. It’s far too horrifying to do all at once. We must take it in tiny stages, lest we be blinded by the outrageous shame of our dysfunction.

If you grew up like I did, help was not free. It was a transaction. For a people pleaser, this meant confusion and anger a lot of the time, because there were no words around this. The system was built on glances, silences, tense body language, raised voices, narrowed eyes and other not-so-subtle clues. You picked your way through this minefield, hoping not to be blown up while trying to earn love and gold stars from others by being so good and helpful that you ached from it.

I learned to control by offering help, while refusing it from others so I wouldn’t owe anyone and they would all owe me. Perhaps not so sunny, but true nonetheless.

Now I practice offering help with no strings attached. It’s new and radical. It’s also hard. I push myself to receive help, support and care from others without feeling that I must repay a silent debt. Unspooling these complex, dysfunctional behaviours is a lengthy job. I must remember that it’s okay to go slow. Many people never even try to face their unvarnished souls – it’s simply too shocking and painful.

Progress towards health is preferable to remaining in denial and darkness. I yearn for light, for beauty, for healing, for restoration. True help is freely given, not bartered for something else or held over another’s head as a ransom demand. That is control. Just because I grew up with that doesn’t mean I can’t change these patterns for my children and for the last half of my life.

I know there is a better way because I’ve seen it in action and felt its warmth on my skin. Love does not demand to be noticed. It is offered with no guarantee it will be returned. I’m going to lean in to this truth, to wear it like a coat and see where it will take me.

In Identity, Minimalism, Nurture, Parenting, Personal Growth

Redefining Bravery

Julianne HarveyJune 21, 2016June 20, 2016Leave a comment

Last week, a friend redefined bravery to me. I was searching for the escape hatch, the red nuclear “launch” button, the excuse to reboot and start over instead of facing up to a difficult and messy situation.

She said, “Showing up when it’s hard is brave, too.” I really, really needed to hear this. When it gets dark all around us and we can no longer find our way, it’s human nature to want to flee. And sometimes, of course, this is the right course of action. But many times, the courageous act is to stay strong when the storm is blowing. To refuse to run, even though it would relieve the pressure and make things easier for a while. But there are also great lessons to be learned from staying put.

I’m so grateful to this friend, for she had the guts to give me her honest thoughts. She did not say what I hoped she would, in my moment of desperation with my bold plan to sell everything we own and go on a madcap family adventure. Instead, she listened and offered another perspective, one born from her own painful experiences with loss and growth.

Bravery takes many forms. When life is unforgivingly tough, as it often is, our courage can desert us when we need it most. This is why the community of loved ones we have invested in and built up is so critical. When we lose all perspective and a good deal of our common sense and optimism, we need people who know us and love us to talk us out of the darkness and back to the light.

Stability is no small thing. It matters, to us and to those who count on us. When we feel lost and bereft, it’s tempting to go for the rash and daring option; to shake up the status quo and let the damn chips fall where they may. In certain seasons and stages, this can be entirely appropriate and helpful to jump-start a necessary change, but at other times it’s the coward’s way.

Everything shifted for me during the course of our conversation. It was like putting on glasses so the fuzzy edges came into focus. The fever dream had passed and I could stop thinking about surviving each day and move my vision out by a year or two. Jason and I needed a fresh heart-to-heart, so we could redefine the future we committed to when we joined our lives together nearly eighteen years ago.

It all looks different again, even though nothing outwardly has changed. Life is still hard. I continue to long for something new and hopeful. Every one of us needs extra breathing space in our soul from time to time. We are birds who must summon the courage to stretch our wings and take flight. We all need each other, for support, encouragement and care.

In Nurture, Relationships

Nurture is Valuable: Unconditional Love

Julianne HarveyJune 14, 2016June 13, 2016Leave a comment

Nurture doesn’t exist without unconditional love. Without it, nurture is a business exchange: I’ll give you care and attention and in return you will do the same for me.

I’ve been ruminating on the phrase “nurture is valuable” since January. I’ve thrown out a call to women to answer interview questions on the topic and I’ve received nine sets of answers so far. Not one of these answers has been identical, so clearly it’s a huge topic with a wide variety of experiences and nuances.

Personally, I have a love/hate relationship with the word nurture. Sometimes it sounds weak to me, and I grew up despising all forms of weakness. At other times the word feels soft, warm and approachable, but this is also foreign and uncomfortable in a vague, undefined way.

In my heart, I’ve always been naturally drawn to nurture but it took me a while to build up the courage to admit this. I’ve longed to cultivate it and see it grow, even when I didn’t have many examples of it to learn from. I think it was a seed, hard and unwatered, that took decades of dormancy before it could bloom.

When Ava was born thirteen years ago, like many new parents, I began to understand for the first time what unconditional love might actually look like. I only glimpsed it in fits and starts – it would take me another seven years to finally put it into practice with the help of my counsellor.

I needed to allow my perfect facade to fall to the ground and shatter before I could embrace the messy agony of my own vulnerable humanity. For me, this was the start of unconditional love. It was awful at first; isolating and uncertain. It required me to offer so damn much of myself – initially to my children, then to my husband, my friends and some extended family members.

True nurture doesn’t allow us to hide who we really are. Its price tag is steep for a reason: we have no guarantee that our affection and care will be returned in the same measure it is given. The key is to replenish our own tank by offering unconditional love back to ourselves so we can continue to pour it out to those we love. Without self-care, nurture is a temporary proposition. You will burn out if you don’t know how to refuel.

Nurture has so many elements. I look forward to diving in deeper to this topic over the summer. I’d love to hear from more of you on this. If you consider yourself a nurturer in any way at all, please get in touch to answer five short questions for my research project.

I do believe nurture is valuable and that it only succeeds from a place of unconditional love. This makes it risky and powerful. We give without any assurance that we will receive it back. We must look after ourselves in order to nurture others. My dream is to build a community of nurturers who can encourage, support and care for one another. Without nurture, our world is a cold, terrifying and desperate place.

Would you like to be involved? Get in touch and let’s unpack some of these ideas together!