On the Threshold

Let’s grow: inner knowing

by Jennifer Nice on Nov 1, 2021 category Mid-life

I’ve been procrastinating writing this post for a while. It’s been an interesting, albeit gorgeous (as you can see from the photo) fall. The irony is I’ve had more margin and time to write since I’m job searching and not going to work everyday, but the words have been just tumbling around inside me, unable to to express anything coherent. So, please bear with me this month!

When I say interesting, I’m referring to the interior field trip I’ve been on and how it has played out with some experiences in my exterior life. The opportunities to strengthen my inner knowing have been relentless and persistent. So I’ve been paying attention.

Richard Rohr has explained that we live ourselves into new ways of thinking, rather than thinking ourselves into new ways of living. I have pondered what that means. He recommends “voluntary displacement” – get out of your routine, your group, your comfort zone, your little world. Any little effort that perhaps makes us uncomfortable and gives us new ways of seeing and helps rewire our brain. This is probably why I love traveling, especially to foreign countries, so deeply. When we sailed on Semester At Sea it was an endless string of discomforts along with the adventures, but I have never felt so alive. Alas, international travel doesn’t happen much these days, so I try to look for other avenues to “live” myself into new ways of thinking. This includes my inner knowing.

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Expectations, joy, grief

by Jennifer Nice on Sep 16, 2021 category Mid-life

Last month I was in Southern California to drop my daughter off for her junior year of college. Lucky for me, beloved friends I met in college still live in the area, so visits to SoCal always fill my bucket in more ways than one. After her work day, one of my friends invited me to go to an AKT class with her (she likes to try new fitness trends, of which there is no shortage of in Southern California!) I wasn’t sure what to expect, but I’m always game for a new physical challenge, so of course I said yes.

When we arrived, the instructor “Chelsi” personally greeted me and was dressed head to toe in 80’s exercise garb, including “Let’s get physical” splashed across her bodysuit. I smirked inside, remembering how Santa gave me that Olivia Newton John album in 5th grade. Chelsi informed us it was 80’s week, hence her “costume.” The class turned out to be a super high energy aerobics class that kicked my butt. Waayy harder than the aerobics classes I took in the late eighties and early nineties…or maybe it’s just that my muscles are now 50 years old! She cranked the 80’s tunes for the entire hour and taught us (not so) simple choreography the last half of class. Even though I was sweating bullets and gasping for breath, a huge smile plastered my face the whole time. When the disco ball sprinkled its shimmery lights everywhere for the “last dance,” joy was literally bubbling up inside me. The novelty, the familiarity, the music, the endorphins, the zero expectations….all of the above made me feel giddy in a way I hadn’t for a very long time.

Joy truly does show up unexpectedly. We just need to be ready and receptive.

Earlier in the summer that was not my posture. At all.

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Walking into the unknown

by Jennifer Nice on Aug 8, 2021 category Mid-life

“The opposite of faith is not doubt, but certainty.” – Anne Lamott

Walking in darkness is a metaphor used in many faith traditions. It means to keep the faith even when we can’t “see” the outcome. A few weeks ago I went on a solo hike at Cascade Head, needing nature therapy and movement to shake out some frustrations and fears. Cascade Head is situated near the coast and in the past, I’ve been lucky to hike it on clear days that afford incredible views of the ocean and the coastline.

On this day, it was sunny and about 70 degrees at the trailhead and within minutes I shed my sweatshirt, stashing it behind a tree. As soon as I emerged from the lush Sitka spruce forest into the prairie grass headland, the wind whipped up and the fog engulfed me. I trudged on, head down, hat pulled low and tight after the wind lifted it off my head once…pissed off for not keeping my sweatshirt, and feeling sorry for myself that I had to endure cold and uncomfortable hiking conditions.

As the trail steepened and my lower limbs grew weary, I kept looking up to the “summit” wondering how much farther. The fog sabotaged my visual efforts each and every time. I knew it was there but couldn’t see nor remember how close it actually was. Stubborn me, I kept going, misery lacing each step. I knew there was a lesson lurking somewhere in this hike. So, I plodded on and on. Once I read we must sit with our pain long enough to learn what it has to teach us. The fogged-in summit illustrated in sharp irony the present liminal space I find myself in.

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Live the questions to let go

by Jennifer Nice on Jul 1, 2021 category Mid-life

Letting go. Or as Elsa belted out in Frozen “Let it go!” How many times have we heard that phrase in our lives? Personally, I used to hate this phrase. Too simplistic. Too trite. And if I let go, that would mean I didn’t care. Which wasn’t true, usually. Let’s face it, it’s hard to let go, especially to something that has served us or benefited us in some way.

But when we find ourselves in liminal space, aka the waiting room, actively waiting (seems like a paradox) can actually help us. Letting go is a practice, not a “one and done” mic drop. Letting go can feel like a death of sorts when we release anything or anyone that we have clung to. It can feel painful, sad, weird, uncomfortable. It’s a loss of control. I have heard letting go described as self-emptying. Ponder that.

While the practice of letting go can feel like grieving, it helps widen our field of consciousness. Makes us more expansive. It creates space for newness. We can learn to cultivate an awareness and courage to recognize an opportune moment. It helps us get ready and stay ready for what is next.

Letting go provides us new opportunities, new learning, new ways of seeing, new relationships. Honestly, it’s the beginning of transformation.

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Forces inviting us into liminal space

by Jennifer Nice on Jun 1, 2021 category Mid-life

One of my favorite authors is Sue Monk Kidd.The first book I read of hers was The Secret Life of Bees, almost 20 years ago (and I highly recommend her newest, The Book of Longings.) Just before my 50th birthday this winter, I picked up When the Heart Waits, which she wrote in 1990 (I was a freshman in college!) well before she was ever famous. Here is the quote from the inside jacket, which compelled me to buy the book:

“I was standing on the shifting ground of midlife, having come upon that time in life when one is summoned to an inner transformation, to a crossing over from one identity to another. When change-winds swirl through our lives, especially in midlife, they often call us to undertake a new passage of the spiritual journey: that of confronting the lost self – our true self. They call us to come home to ourselves to become who we really are.”

Sue Monk Kidd, When the Heart Waits

Talk about synchronicity! The notion of liminal space keeps popping up for me in unexpected places, even when it’s not called that. Kind of like when you buy a new car and you notice all of a sudden it seems every other person is driving the same vehicle.

The chapter “Crisis as Opportunity” provided the most succinct explanation for why we find ourselves in liminal space. Personally, the word “crisis” signals danger or stress for me. I really don’t like the word. But Kidd points out that “a crisis is a holy summons to cross a threshold. It involves both a leaving behind and a stepping toward…a separation and an opportunity.”

This photo was taken in Neskowin a couple of days ago. Neskowin is a little beach I’ve been visiting since I was a young kid, but this past weekend we happened to be on the south side of the creek. It was my first time on the south end of Neskowin beach in 30+ years and it felt synchronous to discover this keyhole in Proposal Rock. I’m captured by the imagery of this photo for crossing a threshold.

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Blooming when Broken

by Jennifer Nice on Apr 29, 2021 category Mid-life

The inspiration for this title sprang from a phenomenon I observed while hiking through Tice Woods at Rotary Nature Preserve a couple of weeks ago. I feel so lucky this nature park is a 5 minute walk from my house, and I regularly indulge in “forest therapy” on the trails here. However, there was a massive ice storm in our area over Valentine’s Day weekend and hundreds of trees splintered and many toppled completely under the weight of the ice. My beloved nature park, along with other parks in our town have been officially closed with all the downed trees. The last month I have ventured over there a few times, carefully picking my way along the trails that are unobstructed; I just couldn’t stay away from my neighborhood forest.

I noticed these brilliant snow-white blooms on this fallen tree and they stopped me in my tracks. How is it possible for a tree to bloom when it’s downed? How does something grow when it’s supposedly cut off from its life source – the roots nourished by the rich earth? I’m no botanist, or even remotely gifted in science, so instead of trying to figure out the answer, I simply marveled and pondered. Nature often provides me solace and a reminder that all living creatures are resilient. Just like this fallen tree, we, too, can “bloom” even if we feel broken.

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Living from the True Self

by Jennifer Nice on Apr 6, 2021 category Mid-life

I snapped this photo a few weeks ago when I was walking downtown, waiting to meet my sisters. For some reason I decided to wander to the top level of the parking garage, and I reminisced about the one and only “Roof Top” teen dance that I attended back in the summer of 1985 when the structure was newly built (when you live in your hometown, memories like this pop up regularly!)

Are you who you want to be? It’s the perennial question for us human beings. I wonder who spray painted that phrase and what motivated them to do so. It was synchronicity to stumble across this message.

A concept I’ve been exploring for a few years now is what it means to live from our True Selves. At some point in mid-life, most of us have the opportunity to face and reconcile this notion. What is the True Self?

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Walking into 50

by Jennifer Nice on Feb 21, 2021 category Mid-life

*I wrote this a couple of days before my birthday…and naturally struggled with the technicalities of getting this blog up and running. So, here I am a few weeks later. That’s okay. The hat I’m wearing is a party favor from my friend Susan’s 50th birthday party 2 years ago. I may journey through this “born to be 50 tour” all year.

Happy birthday to me. Today I turn 50 years old.

In 2011, on my 40th birthday, I sailed around the Cape of Good Hope, South Africa, while working as staff on Semester at Sea. The ocean was fierce and seasickness roiled me the majority of the day. It was a small price to pay for adventure – we had just spent 6 incredible days in Cape Town where I vowed I would return in 10 years for my entire birthday month (obviously did not happen!) My fellow LLC (Living Learning Community) staff and kids surprised me with a cake and singing at the pool deck.

Twenty years ago, turning 30, I celebrated at the Greek Cuisina in downtown Portland with my husband and dear family. As I was 5 months pregnant with my first child, there were no toasts with Ouzo, but we danced to a lively band and threw white plates to the floor to watch them shatter, which I guess is a tradition in Greece, or at least at that particular Greek restaurant.

Back in 1991, I honestly do not remember my 20th birthday at the University of Redlands. But I can guarantee you it likely involved drinking red solo cups full of foamy beer with the Friend Lottery, amazing women I have the privilege to still be friends with to this day.

This new blog, On The Threshold, is my gift to myself. And to anyone who wants to read it and perhaps learn something, or feel something, or do something because of my words. Or not, and that’s okay. My spiritual journey has not been linear, and I suspect other people’s isn’t either.

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