How I am Making the New Facebook Homepage Work for Me

In a phrase - I've sorted my friends.

Facebook lets you make lists of friends (go to top blue bar, hover over friends, pick all friends, then click on "make a new list). After you have made your lists, you can use the lists to see the updates from just those friends. All you do is click on the list name on the homepage. So I've made lists of my immediate family, my extended family, Shane's immediate family, his extended family, friends from high school, friends from college, friends from grad school, work friends, SLC friends, etc. You could make a list of "people whose status updates are always funny" if you wanted.

You can also click on the type of update you want to see. For example, if you only want to look at all the awesome links your buds post, click on links. If you just want to see pics, click on pics. (These are all on the left-hand side control bar).

I don't love the new FB homepage, but hey, change is life, life is change. I deal. :-)

New blogs that I've added to my "roll"

I just added Margaret Ruth and Byron Katie's blogs to my "roll."

I love MR - she gives free "love questions only" readings on X-96 Friday mornings - and what she really does is give some of the best relationship advice I have ever heard.

I first heard about BK from a friend of mine from my woman's group. I'm not totally in love with her process but it is useful to pull you head out of your delusions and see things as they really are. Her blog is accessible - and weird.

Enjoy!

This week has slipped through my fingers . . .

Like water
Or rice
Or yarn.

More about Tao of Equus and The Forgiving Self

These books have definitely captured me. I have bookmarked so many pages and started writing down great quotes that I hope to share in later posts.

I just went to the website for Epona Equestrian Services and found pictures of the horses that Kohanov writes about: http://www.taoofequus.com/gallery.html I am so glad I get to put faces with the names! I particularly like the pictures of the horses in motion.

One idea from Tao of Equus that is really present in my mind today is the idea of giving boys the space they need to express their male energy without punishment. Kohanov writes about one horse (Merlin) who had been punished for expressing his vital energy - and as a result he came to associate his life force with punishment, pain and fear. As the mother of two young boys that insight struck me to the core. My boys do have a vital male energy that I cannot really relate to - but I hope to give them space to express that energy in ways that are beneficial to their community and to themselves. My hope is that they see their male energy as vital and life-giving, rather than something destructive that must be suppressed or disciplined out of them.

I have also been meditating about Kohanov's ideas about emotional congruence - about letting your body match your emotions. I think that children pick up on real emotions - and not the "nicey-nice" front that we show them. And when the nicey-nice is covering rage - well, the kid will respond to the rage not the front (which generally has the effect of bringing the suppressed rage to the forefront). Robert Karen talks about children's need to protest in The Forgiving Self - he writes, "Protest, which is what anger is all about, is a natural and necessary part of nonnarcissistic connections. People aren't perfectly attuned to us, they don't do the right thing by us all the time, they can be mean and vindictive or simply wrapped up in themselves, and protest is part of the way we negotiate and correct relationships." I realize that I must give my children space for their protests - and really hear those protests - if I am to honor them as human beings. And I must give myself space for my own protests as well.