Latest / In Real Life With Holly B. / Solo Breakfasts, Journaling, Postcards, & a Letter From Seven
Transcript
- Holly B.: Hey friends, welcome to In Real Life with Holly B. That's me. We are here for episode five. I changed the background somewhat so you didn't have to look at a boring hotel room. but I thank you for coming back if you're here with me and for listening to my little bit of a ramble here. Hoping it it resonates with somebody out there. So we are talking about reconnecting with people, humans, animals, whatever it is that brings you joy. But this morning I want to touch upon reconnecting with yourself. Just for a moment, if I can. We will always go back to the connections made with others, but the reason I'm thinking about this this morning is because I dropped off my husband to his conference. Came back to the room to do some writing. And I had breakfast first. I sat in the lovely little restaurant overlooking the bay that opens up into the ocean. mountainous looking over at trees on Cliff edges, it's breathtaking and it's actually unbelievable. I have to pinch myself again today. How lucky am I that I get to experience this part of Canada? I'm very lucky. what I wanted to chat about was reconnecting with yourself, Before you can actually even connect with other people, are you able to connect with yourself? I feel like that has gotten much easier over time. I had breakfast this morning, there were people all around me. And I'm sure somebody probably thought, huh, she's sitting there all by herself. That's not unusual for me to do that. In fact, I enjoy it. Gives me time to sit and think. I enjoy having breakfast with others and meals in restaurants with others. And in fact, we had one last night and it was so large I couldn't hear anyone. It was very difficult to make conversation, but we did. We persevered. It was lovely, but this morning was just so nice to be quiet by myself. I could enjoy the breakfast in front of me. And a Diet Coke. yes, you may think I'm a little bit off for having Diet Coke with breakfast, but I've been known to do that, so I really enjoyed it and I was able to just sit with my thoughts, think about the day, what's to come, how grateful I am, and Not overthink the flight home, of course, and just connect. So that is something that I have learned to do on my own, as I am not an individual who has these large circles of people. I like to have close circles with close friends, with many acquaintances, I guess, if you will. And I love to be social with people, but I do enjoy my time with myself. Now reconnecting with myself also includes journaling, which I am really trying to develop a routine hoping that will come and that it will make its way into my daily routine. After I'm done chatting with you, I am going straight to my journal. I am sitting by that beautiful window and I am going to journal. I promise. Pinky promise. All right. Now another thing, this restaurant had these beautiful postcards. And I thought, huh, I am going to send this to someone today. I'm not sure who the recipient will be, but you know, follow my my heart. what a beautiful way to connect with someone. Write someone a letter, write them a postcard. Sure, if you need to write an email or a text, that's fine too, but what if you actually got out a beautiful piece of paper with a pen and practiced those handwriting skills and sent it in the mail? Can we bring that back, people? I would love that so much. I've actually created a mail club. Not that this is a sales pitch, but it's part of my Substack and I'm trying to see if it's something that will resonate with people. I'm writing them letters and yeah, trying to to bring back that pen pal, if you will. I'm going to write this postcard, I'm going to write in my journal, and I'm going to spend some time, you know, by myself just doing the things that I love to do, reconnecting, refocusing before I go out into that big old wide world here in the East Coast and connect with others. I think we're gonna go for another massive hike to Signal Hill, and that should be absolutely amazing. So think about that today, if you will. What does that look like reconnecting with yourself? How can you do that? Is there a place that you can go to, that you can spend time, go for a walk outside, inside? It's important to spend time by yourself. And I think I have worked at it. It hasn't always been easy, but I have worked at being comfortable. Being myself, being by myself in open spaces, it's not a comfortable feeling for for many people. But I highly recommend it you know try it on, try it for a few minutes. And if it doesn't feel comfortable at first, practice it. It's like an exercise, right? I promised you a pet letter every episode, and so we are definitely going to do that. This letter is from Susan Hartzler. I interviewed her several months ago on the Ramblings from the Little Shed podcast. she has quite a relationship with her dog Seven, who is a beautiful dog, who is a Hollywood star, in fact, who has been in many productions. Susan writes on her Substack Which includes so much of her canine knowledge. Susan sent me this beautiful letter from her dog Seven, and I would love to read that for you now. Dear Mom. You like to tell people you rescued me when I was 10 months old. I suppose technically that's true. I had spent my puppyhood in the show dog world, surrounded mostly by other Australian shepherds. I had never lived in a house. I didn't know much about being somebody's dog, and you apparently didn't remember how much trouble a 10-month-old puppy could get into. Three television remotes, several leather shoes, a brand new pair of Uggs, and some sprinkler wires later. You remembered, you're welcome. But I learned. I learned about houses and walks and sleeping somewhere that belonged to me. I learned that when you leave you come back. I learned that I didn't have to do anything special to earn my place with you. Eventually you decided I might have something to offer other people too. We became a therapy dog team. You took me places where people needed a dog beside them. I learned that sometimes my job was simply to stay close. No tricks, no fixing anything, just be there. But then again, dogs. Dogs understand that better than people sometimes. We've done a lot together since then. I've posed for calendar covers, I've been in commercials, I've had my picture taken more times than any respectable Australian shepherd should tolerate. You even decided I should run for president, which frankly seems reasonable. I've met some of my constituents, and the response has been encouraging. But none of those are the things I would put on my resume if dogs had resumes. Put down the ordinary things. Stay close, get mom out of the house, make her laugh when she doesn't particularly feel like laughing. Remind her when it is time to stop working and go for a walk. Listen without interrupting. Love her on the days when she isn't feeling especially lovable. I'm 12 now. You notice that I'm slowing down. I know because you watch me more carefully than you used to. Sometimes you look at me when you think I'm not paying attention. I'm paying attention. I can't do everything I once did. But pick up my leash and you'll see that I'm still here. There's somewhere to go. Something to smell, someone to meet, another day worth getting excited about. You've spent a lot of years telling stories about what dogs give people. You've even written books about it. So, after twelve years, I thought I'd save you some trouble and explain it myself. You gave me a home, I gave you my whole life. I think we both got a pretty good deal. Love, seven. PS seven for president. It's not too late. I agree, seven. That was a beautiful letter from Seven to his dog mama, Susan. And Susan, thank you so much for that beautiful letter. I appreciate it so much. and same to you, Seven, if you're listening with your dog mama. I appreciate you, listener, for being here with me and for hanging in there as I continue this quest of my 30-day podcast challenge. Come back tomorrow. There'll be another letter. There'll be another anecdote. Not sure which one yet. I get to pick from so many amazing ones. And if you have a letter or if you have a story that you want to share with me, do it. Send it to in real life with Holly B at gmail.com. And I will put it in the queue for one of the next episodes. Maybe not this episode of 30, but I'll get you in there right after. Alright, folks, I'm headed off to that hike. I wish you the best day, whatever you're doing, whatever time of the year this is, and I'll see you tomorrow. Thanks for now.