Jim and I will celebrate our 41st wedding anniversary this weekend.  As I read what I’ve just written I’m afraid to look in the mirror. I’m half expecting to see a short stout woman with a lovely white perm!  How did more than four decades fly past us?!

If someone was asking if I had a significant other, I would have a quick and easy answer, “Yes, Jim.”  Jim has been what the world would define as my significant other for most of my life.  He and I have walked, sometimes run and sometimes bumbled through life together.  I talk to him about all of my decisions and we make plans for life together.  All this makes him significant.

Even though this is true, and even though Jim is certainly significant in my life, I don’t love this term, significant other.  It implies two things that don’t sit well with me.  The first is if a person doesn’t happen to be involved in a romantic relationship, they aren’t given licence to use the term.  Society would say they neither have a significant other, nor are they a significant other.  It feels horrible for me to think that simply because a person doesn’t have a current life partner that we should conclude they do not have a significant other.  The second is I don’t believe we each only have one significant other.  Our lives are filled with people, many of whom hold great significance for us.

As our anniversary arrives, I’ve been pondering this idea of significant other, and more specifically significance; what does it mean to be of significance?

To be significant means to have importance in, or influence on a person’s life.  Jim of course, fits this definition.  He is infinitely significant in all parts of my life.  He is my trusted partner on our journey through life.  Yet, no matter how wonderful he may be, it’s unreasonable to expect him to be the perfect partner for every single part of my life.  While he is the person I have come home to and shared my life with for over forty years, he has not been the only person I’ve experienced life with.  My life has been shaped by so many people of significance.

Some of my significant others are significant because they have known me as a little girl.  It takes a long time to make an old friend.  Often only those who knew us when, can fully understand where we have come from, and why we are who we are.

Some significant others are newer to my life and yet are no less significant.  It’s affirming to have someone meet us right where we are and accept the person we have become, without always comparing her to the girl we once were. 
I have significant others in all areas of my life.  I have those I love to dance with and those I love to hike with.  I have those I love to talk with and those I love to learn with.  I have those I love to teach with.  I have those I love to share adventures with and those I love to ponder with.  Some I love to visit with and some to dream with.  Some I love to sing with, and some to bike with.  Some I love to challenge me, and some to simply accept me.  Some I love to tease me and some I love to take me seriously. 

Each of these is significant because each allows me to reveal a tiny piece of the puzzle that is me.  The more significant people we have as influences, the more interesting and beautiful our self-portrait becomes.

I had a most wonderful teacher in grades two and three, Mrs. Ann Beausejour.  In grades seven and eight I was lucky enough to have her again, for a few hours each week for Art.  I loved her.  She was everything a teacher should be, and was one of my earliest influences to become a teacher.  She had it all; kindness, grace, competence, integrity, brilliance, creativity and encouragement.  She was beautiful and so was her handwriting, which I tried so hard to emulate.  The things I learned from her I brought with me to every single lesson I ever taught.  I’m guessing some of my students who are now teachers themselves continue to bring Mrs. Beausejour with them.  She most definitely has been a significant other for most of my life.

Contrasting this, I had a short interaction in Chapter’s this week.  I stopped to pick up a book, and while there, couldn’t resist finding a new book for Ben too.  I found one about garbage trucks I hoped would be a hit.  When I reached the till to pay, the cashier picked up the Ben book, held it gently and said, “Oh, this really hits me for some reason”.   I waited, assuming there could be more.  “My dad was a garbage truck driver.  I lost him in January.”  He proceeded to tell me how difficult it was to spend his Dad’s final year not being able to do the things his dad would have loved.  Not being able to take him out of the care home he was in and not being able to visit as much as he would have in other times.  I know this particular Chapter’s employee only from chatting with him while checking out when I’ve been in to the store.  I know if he were asked, he would say he does not have a significant other.  And yet, I suspect that during the time it took for our brief encounter, he might acknowledge we were significant to each other.  We were significant others. 

Luckily, each day we have the chance to both appreciate and perhaps even connect with our significant others.  We also have the chance to be significant others.  Sometimes these moments are expected.  We might make a phone call to or text a friend, or visit with our children.  Other times we simply find ourselves in a moment; a moment of significance.  In these times we become, however briefly, significant others.

May we each find ourselves at the giving and receiving end of significance this week.

My inquiry for you this week is, “How am I holding space for significance?”
​
Elizabeth is a certified professional Leadership Coach, and the owner of Critchley Coaching.  She is the founder and president of the Canadian charity, RDL Building Hope Society.   She works with corporations, non-profits and the public sector, providing leadership coaching.  She creates and facilitates custom workshops for all sizes of groups. She has particular expertise in facilitating Strategic Plans for organizations. Contact Elizabeth to learn how to hold space for significance.
 

After my comment a few weeks ago, waxing on about how I love Spring and all the new life it brings, I’ve found myself returning to this thought and wondering if I really meant it.  I do of course.  Especially after our family has been able to celebrate new life in the form of little Andy’s arrival.  And yet, spring is not all new life and increasing warmer temperatures, open windows and open-toed shoes.  It brings as much snow mould as it does crocuses, and more cool winds than warm.

At her very best, Spring has us smiling as we take our walks, and re-learning how to wave to passing cyclists.  She is hopeful and uplifting.  She draws us in to her optimism.

And so, I found myself surprised on Tuesday, when I met Brenda early in the morning as the sun was shining her first rays on the mountains toward which I had just driven.  My first surprise came in the form of the reading on the thermometer.  It was -12°C.  My second surprise was in the freshly fallen four inches of new snow.  And my third surprise was in the many feet of snow, unmarked by footprints, at the top of a new trail, Sugar Pony.  All of this in April, in Spring.  It shouldn’t have surprised me, but it did.

Brenda and I never lack for good conversation as we wander.  Most of it is just chit chat, but usually once along the way we try to ponder some of life’s more interesting ideas.  On the agenda this week we talked about how we could become more of the version of the people we strive to be.  As is most often the case, we never did manage to answer the query.  We tossed it back and forth, became distracted by bobcat tracks and mountain views, and let it sit wherever it landed in our minds.

For me, it’s landed in the folder in my mind labelled Seasons.  I used to have an impression of the seasons of life.  Being logical and mathematical, I’d love for life to follow a clean, linear progression.  Well, I might not love it, but I could certainly get used to the predictability of it.  I once thought we travelled through four seasons of life.  I’ve read about being in the summer of one’s life (I can now guess this might be our 30’s and 40’s).  And of course, the winter of life denotes the final chapter.  When thought of in this simplistic way, there are only these four seasons, and they follow one another in certain fashion.

I no longer have this belief.  The seasons of life, it turns out, are many, and ever changing. Sometimes our seasons even overlap.

As I’ve wrestled with the question of exactly what qualities I am striving to have more of in my life, in other words of what season I am in, I recognize I am in a season as complex and fickle as that of Spring in Calgary.  Just when I think I might have it figured out, when I know the exact right jacket to wear, I turn a corner and find out God has a sense of humour.  I try to line my ducks up in a row, only to discover they want to play in a puddle.

Many people have told me this is my season to relax, to enjoy our grandchildren, to do all the things I didn’t have time for before.  But this doesn’t feel like a good recipe for me.  It’s a full plate, but it doesn’t have the right ingredients for me.  I still have proposals to write, a new idea for a children’s book, workshops to create and facilitate, fitness goals to achieve, a new bike to break in, adventures to seek, songs to sing, quilts to design, sweaters to create, and wisdom to acquire.  And yet, when I plan my week and go full tilt, I don’t feel like I’ve settled into my most perfect routine.  More importantly, I don’t feel like I’m fully being the me I’m striving to be.

Over and over, I ponder: What season IS this?  Is this the season to do more? To do less?

No matter how I frame it, or mull it over, or analyze it, or try to pull it into line, I am left with a little (brilliant) voice whispering to me:  This season will not be defined by what you are doing.   Seasons are defined by who you are being while you are doing.  It brings me right back to our conversation on the trail.  What qualities am I striving to have more of in my life?  How can I become more of the version of myself I want to be?

When I look to Spring for inspiration, I recognize she is a great model for me.  She too has so much she wants to do in three short months.  She wants to warm the ground, to prepare it for new growth. She wants to clean the snow away.  She wants to inspire others and welcome new life.  She works relentlessly to increase daylight hours and to paint the landscape with colour.  I also recognize she continuously has roadblocks placed in her way.  Every single year, just as she strikes an easy rhythm with her list, she is assaulted with challenges.  Spring snow storms arrive covering fresh blossoms and budding flowers.  Grass fires scorch hillsides.  Winds tear down branches and wipe out newly constructed bird nests.
Despite it all, Spring persists in her optimism.  She marches calmly forward, being herself.  Never, not once, has Spring simply admitted defeat and said, “Ok.  There will be no Spring this year.”

Thinking about Spring in this way has helped me sort out what I’m trying to understand about myself and put into practice.  I, like Spring, have a grand plan.  I have many things to do.  And like Spring, more importantly than all my doing, I have a way I want to be in this season.  I want to listen with understanding. I want to reach out to those I care about.  I want to build more bridges. I want to be less right and more present.  I want to gain in wisdom.

Spring tells me this is possible.  She teaches us to expect setbacks, but to continue to melt the snow, encourage new growth, welcome new life, and to never, never simply choose to skip this season.

Each of us is in our own unique season, with its own to do list and its own storms.  Let’s focus less on the details of the storms and challenges, and more on the growth we hope to look back upon and smile at with satisfaction.  There is a lot of beauty to be found in this season.

My inquiry for you this week is, ‘Who am I becoming this season?’
​
Elizabeth is a certified professional Leadership Coach, and the owner of Critchley Coaching.  She is the founder and president of the Canadian charity, RDL Building Hope Society.   She works with corporations, non-profits and the public sector, providing leadership coaching.  She creates and facilitates custom workshops for all sizes of groups. She has particular expertise in facilitating Strategic Plans for organizations. Contact Elizabeth to learn how to make the best of this season.
 
 

We were watching the evening news one night this week when a really neat story about a heart transplant recipient was featured. Ray Bruce was living on Vancouver Island when he had a heart attack in late Fall of 2019.  He needed a heart transplant and was put on the donor recipient list.  About a month later, when he and his wife were staying with their daughter in a remote part of Vancouver Island, a heart became available, but the medical staff, led by Dr. Jamil Bashir, head of Cardiac Surgery at University of British Columbia, could not reach him.

Knowing time was of the utmost importance, the team had to get creative.  Someone had the brilliant idea to involve the RCMP, and as luck would have it, one of Canada’s finest, Constable Tyler Jensen, happened to answer the call and made it his mission to track down Ray Bruce with the news of the available heart and the quickly approaching deadline.  The sensitive timeline was made, and today Ray Bruce is enjoying a full life with his new heart.

Because of Jim’s heart issues, I found the entire story to be intriguing, and I was particularly struck by the comments made by Dr. Bashir.  When pressed as to why they worked so hard to track down Ray Bruce, Dr. Bashir said, ‘We had in our possession, a gift.  This is the kind of gift that just has to be delivered.’   

No question, it was the link to Jim and his heart, along with my complete understanding that ‘There but for the grace of God go we’, that caused me to continue thinking about this comment long after the news was over.

I was still thinking about it as I hiked on Tuesday.   Actually, I wasn’t thinking so much about hearts, although mine certainly was beating as we climbed high in the foothills in deep snow, as I was thinking about gifts.  I’ve heard it said over and over, and I’ve coached this idea using slightly different wording, that the best gift we can ever give is the gift of being completely ourselves.  It’s taken me a long time to come to terms with this. 

I don’t think I’m the only person in the world who might have doubts that being myself may not win first prize in the ‘Best Gift I Could Give the World’ category.  I think there are a lot of people who could join this club with me.  Many people who know me would likely say I am true to myself; that I do bring my true self to the table.   The fact is, for the longest time, I couldn’t even figure out what it might look like for me to be completely myself.  I would often observe what worked for others and try to incorporate bits of it into my being.  Over time, some of this stuck, and some parts were let go.  Other times, I would minimize certain of my traits, having self-judged myself and found these traits to not be quite up to snuff.

As Brenda and I climbed, we were following some footsteps in the snow.  About two-thirds to the top of the mountain, the footprints stopped.   Upon close examination, we figured out the person actually turned around and returned the way they had come.   From that point on, we were making a new trail.  I was in the lead to start, so it was my foot strikes that left the marks in the deep snow.  Some time later as we trundled along, looking for the side trail that would take us to our breathtaking ‘lunch room’, we checked our handy phone app and realized we had overshot our mark.  We needed to turn around and head back down the way we came, this time with a sharper eye out for the illusive trail.

Turning down, I was again in the lead and following my own footprints.  But no matter that these exact prints had been made by me only minutes earlier, I found my steps no longer fit comfortably in either the prints I had made, or in the prints Brenda left.  I was flummoxed.  How could it be that I could not fit right into the very prints I myself had made?

As I walked along, more downhill now that we had turned, I thought about trying to walk in these footprints.  I could certainly do it.  But it wasn’t a perfectly comfortable fit.  If I wanted to use the ready-made prints, I had to adjust my step.  In other words, I had to become, ever so slightly, someone who wasn’t quite the new me; the walking downhill me.

This very small moment in time has had quite an impact on me.  I’ve been wondering how often in life we are unable to give the world the gift of being ourselves because we are caught up in either being the person we think others expect us to be, or being someone we used to be and still think we should or can be.  We are trying to fit into footsteps that are not ours to fit.  In the case of hiking, I had already changed in only a few minutes.  So, the best version of myself was no longer the girl who had marched up the hill, it had to be the girl who was navigating the downhill.

Most of us will never donate our heart to someone else.  Most of us will never be called to donate a kidney or bone marrow, or part of a liver.  Many will never even donate the gift of blood.  Yet every single day we have the chance to simply show up in the world, to donate to the world, the gift our ourselves.  Even typing this I hesitate, trying to override old teachings about not becoming too full of myself.   I remind myself that being fully myself does not mean I need to be better than I was yesterday, or better than anyone else.  It is simply an acknowledgment on my part that by showing up as myself, I am showing up as who I was put on this earth to be.

Last week we welcomed little Baby Andy to our family.  He is simply beautiful.  Several people have wondered if he is like Ben.  If you’ve read even one little blog of mine about Ben, you will know I think Ben is absolutely perfect.  But I hope Andy is not ‘just like Ben’.  I have no doubt Andy has his own trademarks of absolute perfection.  I will champion them both to live into their full selves.  No one else in this world can be better at being them than they can. 

The same goes for the rest of us.  Paraphrasing the wise words of Dr. Bashir, ‘We have in our hands a gift.  This is the kind of gift that just has to be delivered.’

My inquiry for you this week is, ‘What gift am I delivering?’
​
Elizabeth is a certified professional Leadership Coach, and the owner of Critchley Coaching.  She is the founder and president of the Canadian charity, RDL Building Hope Society.   She works with corporations, non-profits and the public sector, providing leadership coaching.  She creates and facilitates custom workshops for all sizes of groups. She has particular expertise in facilitating Strategic Plans for organizations. Contact Elizabeth to learn how to deliver your gifts.
 

Even the energy in the air feels like it has new life in it.  Little ones have traded clunky snow boots for slip on runners; it’s much easier to maneuver a bike or scooter when wearing these.

In our home, while we’ve been observing our ritual of anticipating and noticing new life this season, we’ve been doing it closer to home.  We’ve had our minds on one particular new life.   At the writing of this blog, our daughter and son-in-law, Kaitlyn and Matt, Ben’s parents, are expecting their second child.  Understanding that new life reveals itself following its own calendar, we are practicing patience as one overdue day rolls into the next.  What I know for sure about new life is it’s always worth the wait.

As I’ve lain awake many hours of the night waiting for my cue to drive over to watch Ben, so his mom and dad can head to the hospital, I’ve pondered the significance and impact of new life.  Certainly, a baby, a brand-new life, will soon join our family.  But even bigger, and more impactful will be all the new life created by his or her arrival.  Yes, there will certainly be a beautiful baby.  There will also be much more new life to marvel at.

Kaitlyn and Matt will begin a whole new life, a life with one more person to consider, with one more child to love and raise, with new financial considerations, new likes and dislikes, new habits, and new joys.

Greg and Cara too will start a new life.  When little Ben was born, they were living in a different part of the country.  Their relationship with this new baby will form part of their new life. 

So too will Ben’s life be new.  He’ll now bear the title of big brother; a completely new concept for him.

And Jim and I too, we will have new life.  We’ll expand the dining room table to include one more.  I have no doubt my heart will also expand; no doubt to just the right size to house the love I’ll have for this baby.

As I’ve pondered all the new life that will spring from this one little new life, I noticed we each have opportunities to regularly create new life.  We can do it with simple things such as changing a habit, or an attitude, or a tone.  We can welcome a new joy to our life; singing or birdwatching or hiking.  We can open our lives to not-yet friends and long-loved friends.  These all bring new life.  We can close doors, or at least tuck away in closets, things that don’t encourage new life.

At a time in history when we can’t create new life through travel, gathering for sports and cultural events and through gatherings with loved ones, it will serve us well to remember we have it within us to continue to grow, to encourage new life, and to celebrate it.  Even in its tiniest form.

May you find and create new life this week.

P.S.  It is now Saturday, and we are joyfully celebrating the safe arrival of beautiful little one-day-old Andy.  New life.
​
My inquiry for you this week is, ‘What new life needs celebrating?’

 Elizabeth is a certified professional Leadership Coach, and the owner of Critchley Coaching.  She is the founder and president of the Canadian charity, RDL Building Hope Society.   She works with corporations, non-profits and the public sector, providing leadership coaching.  She creates and facilitates custom workshops for all sizes of groups. She has particular expertise in facilitating Strategic Plans for organizations. Contact Elizabeth to learn how to foster and celebrate new life.