Dancing to a different beat

My 6-year-old niece loves to dance. She dances ballet, she dances jigs that look like a variation of Scottish clogging, she dances slow, she dances fast, and she dances to any type of music possible, even her own humming. For several minutes at a time, she gets lost in her own world as she hums her own tune and twirls, bends, and moves to her body's music. She creates a stage in her mind and she dances as if she were in the spotlight, blocking everyone and everything out.

One day I asked her, "Do you love to dance?"
She continued to dance and smiled, "Oh yes, I love to dance!"
"You should take dance lessons and perform, I think you would love it."
Then she thought about it a while, never stopping for a moment, always moving, tapping, twirling with the music in the background. She looked up at me, quite seriously, and said, "No, I don't think so. Then they would tell me what to dance and how to dance. I like to let my body move how it feels - I like to dance to my own beat."

Her comment stuck with me throughout the entire day. I began to think about my own childhood, in a general sense. Like most kids, I was taught to color inside the lines, to take piano lessons and only practice what the teacher assigned, to be good, behave, and be quiet if adults told you to. Children are so often told what to do and how to do it. While authority and guidance to a degree is obviously very important for a child's upbringing, we must also remember to never squash the creativeness out of them.

Why are we so set on telling children they can't sing loud in church, or they can't color the sky pink when the sky is supposed to be blue, or they can't understand something so we refuse to explain anything to them? Why are we so afraid children might get dirty digging in the dirt or sand, when it can easily be washed away, or they can't even run around in the back yard without shoes on because God forbid they might stub their toe? We all know that children aren't perfect and they all don't fit one mold. We also know, exploring and feeling things for themselves helps them learn and express themselves. So why are we as adults so set on taking that away from them?

In a way, my niece's comment was also helpful for my own life as an adult. I heard once that a writer can go to as many writing conferences and read as many books on writing as they want - but like my niece said, they are only telling you what to write and how to write it. It isn't until you let your heart and mind move and think for itself when you truly become a writer. I think I am so afraid to color outside the lines, or explore a little bit, or dance to my own beat that it is hindering me from finding out more about my own self. In a way, I am acting like my own parent or adult, constantly telling myself I can't, when I know I can.

If this seemed like a rant, I apologize. But if you take anything away from this post, at least remember this: We must all learn to dance to our own beat; not to the world's beat, not to another person's beat, but to our own intrinsic orchestra, beckoning us to move and bend with our heart's rhythm.

If my niece, Lily, were to plan my wedding...

Recently, I had a conversation with my four-year-old niece, Lily, about my wedding. Having small nieces proves to be a challenge when explaining to them the rules of engagements, weddings, marriage etc. Lily has asked me several times, "Did you already have the wedding?" or "But I thought you got married already!" She doesn't understand proposals or engagements. On Mother's Day, my dad was toasting to my mom and my older sisters who are also mothers, and Ella chimes in and says, "And Abby too! She's going to be a mother!" I quickly said I most certainly will NOT be a mother anytime soon. Through her explanation she thought that because I was getting married, I will also be a mother very soon as well.

So I had a bit of fun this weekend and asked Lily to "plan" my wedding. Here is what it would be like if she were to plan everything:

Colors: Pink - and lots of pink flowers too.
Food: Pizza
Hair: Up in a bun with a pink flower in it and a reaaalllly long veil.
Dress: Big and poofy like Cinderella's or Belle.
Ceremony: She specifically said "Lots of flowers and plants" and it would be in my hometown church.
Makeup: The more the merrier. Especially lots of eye makeup and bright red or pink lipstick.
Cake: Chocolate cake with lots of frosting. With more flowers on it, preferably pink.
Reception: Lots of dancing, pizza, and flowers. No kissing allowed.

Other details: There should be a "kids place" at the reception just for the kids to have fun, play games and hang out so the adults can have their own fun at the wedding. I should also make sure to have a good photographer that takes lots of pictures. The flower girls should wear tutus and flower headbands in their hair. Michael has to have a good haircut. And very specifically she said, "You and Michael have to sit across the table from each other so you can look into each other's eyes like you love each other very much."

Diamond in the Rough

             This past weekend was an eventful one. After two and a half years of dating a wonderful man, he proposed to me and we are now engaged! In the world of small towns and Facebook, this is probably not much of a secret to anyone who knows either of us. I have had to literally disable Facebook notifications from my iPhone because it has been a constant stream of comments, likes, posts, and tags. In today’s information world, not much is kept secret. I’m guessing you’d like to know how he proposed to me. And if you know me personally, you’d know anything that happens to me is an interesting and partially comical story.

                We began the day with a picnic at the interstate park in Taylor’s Falls. After our little picnic, he went to the car to grab something. He began with a clue and a letter that explained he wanted to do something nice for me every week leading up to our actual engagement to throw me off. Of course I bought the story without any hesitation. Since we began dating, he wrote me a letter every single month for two and a half years, and in each clue he had snippets of those letters guiding me through different stops along the hiking trail. Each stop meant a new clue and letter.

                Well by the time we started hiking, the sun came out and it was beginning to grow fairly warm. Luckily I had worn plenty of layers and I was stripping them off gradually, but Michael was still wearing his fleece zip-up. “Why don’t you take that off, it’s getting so hot out!” I said, since I could see beads of sweat forming on his forehead. “No, I’m fine. I’ll just leave it on.” Because little did I know, in the pocket of that jacket was the ring. I kept persisting that he should take it off, but he refused every time.

                As the walk progressed, he kept getting more and more sweaty. Finally, the last stop on the map was upon us. A year ago, we had carved our names in a tree at this park, but it wasn’t in a very obvious spot. In fact, it was in the middle of the woods and the last time we were there we didn’t bother to mark where it was. After not finding it for quite some time, I noticed Michael’s forehead was now dripping. I suggested we split up to find our tree.

                Later Michael told me he was praying like crazy that we would find it; otherwise he didn’t know what he was going to do. After searching alone, I found it, “Michael! Over here!” I yelled. He quickly ran over to me. We were standing there admiring our handiwork from a year ago when he said, “Look a deer!” I turned around. “Where?” I didn’t see a deer, and was disappointed, but when I turned around Michael was down on one knee with a ring box in his hand.

                You would think my first reaction was to cry or clasp my hand over my mouth. Instead, it was, “What are you doing!?” I was in so much shock I actually thought it was a joke. “Is this a joke!? What’s happening? What are you doing? Oh my Gosh! Are you joking?” Poor Michael was trying to say his planned speech, but I kept stammering like an idiot. “I’m trying to propose to you Abby! This is not a joke.” Then the tears came, but I still kept stammering. In between sobbing I said, “You – you grabbed the wrong hand! It’s this one!” I honestly can’t remember what he said. All I heard was that I was beautiful and amazing and “Abigail Luray Ingalls, will you marry me?”

                If anyone were to see this event take place, they would think I was a hysterical, crazy woman. Shortly after, I was sobbing and laughing at the same time. Also immediately after the crying and the kissing and the hugging waned, he quickly ripped off his fleece jacket, relieved to finally have some fresh air.

                As we walked hand in hand back to our original picnic spot, I admired the way the ring sparkled in the sun, still stunned and shocked that I am now an engaged woman with a fiancé instead of a boyfriend. 

But as I looked up at him, I knew in my heart he was the one I had been waiting for, and the only one I want to spend the rest of my days with. I can't wait to marry the love of my life and my best friend and I am so thankful and blessed that God brought him into my life. I love you Michael Roeller. 

The Pursuit

After traveling to several countries and having the honor to live in New Zealand for a year, I feel that I have been presented a gift; a relic along the seashore. This gift is the gift of perspective. To see and experience how other cultures live, how they live along side each other as citizens, humans, neighbors. My Americanized version of life has been taken a part and then reassembled with new eyes because of these different perspectives. 

You do realize there is an entire world out there right? Besides the one where you, reader, now comfortably sit in your easy chair with a pantry stocked full of food. The more you experience more of life, the world and other cultures - the more you realize you know nothing at all. The more you realize there's more to life than a comfortable house, job, chair etc. Life wasn't meant to be comfortable. 

However, being an American entails some sense of responsibility; to your country, to yourself as an individual, and to other Americans. Whether you know it or not, compared to many parts of the world, you are privileged to be an American. In the Declaration of Independence, there is a phrase that strikes me; "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness."

As an American, as a human being, you have the right to pursue Happiness. 

Pursue. Do you know what that word means? It means to follow, to strive, to gain, to chase, seek to attain or accomplish. But, many Americans chase or pursue that happiness in areas that always fail. Money, sex, power, success (by American standards), clothes, drugs, body image.... 

Let me tell you, I have looked into the eyes of beggars in Italy, poverty-stricken children in Mexico, the simplistic lives of school children in Thailand, laid back New Zealanders with small lives and little drive in life - and I have seen happiness. 

Some of the happiest people I have met do not have much. 

I met a Canadian in Thailand. He was on the back of an Elephant and so was I, and my family and I talked to him as the magnificent beast slowly walked around the most beautiful garden I had ever seen. He quit his comfortable job and was traveling the world.

I met a middle-aged woman who was kicked out of her home in her early teens, just because her parents didn't like her. She had the reading level of a first grader, couldn't drive, never had a career - but she worked with so much zeal, had an extremely compassionate heart and read the Bible every morning; slowly, articulately, word by word. Her face perpetually glowed with joy. 

I met a three-year-old girl on a busy Minneapolis street. With dirt smeared on her face and a messy hairdo she seemed like any other toddler; but her and her family were homeless. She lived and slept in a stroller in her little pink T-shirt. But when my sister and I brought her food in a couple of grocery bags, she ran to us screaming, laughing and smiling - overflowing with happiness and joy. 

I also met a CEO who gave up his dreams to become an artist and focused on business and marketing instead. He lived in an office, interacted little with his employees, and scolded his interns twice for not having the overhead light on over our desks. He had it all, in the worldly sense.

Our pursuit of happiness should never be to get to the highest level of success or to obtain materialistic things. In the end, those things matter little. Find what makes you happy, not content or comfortable, but rather fulfilled and joyful - and do it. Live always in the pursuit of something greater than yourself.