shift to a higher gear

Shift to A Higher Gear

The First of many posts.

      

 Many of you readers know me and my sister personally. Some of you may be new and I hope you are and I hope you will come back.  Recently my sister and I lost our Dad.  Many of you have been so nice and sent me messages of love and support and have inquired about how I am doing. I haven't had time to answer everyone individually so I hope today with this post you will see how I am doing.  ( I promise I am still working on getting back to each and everyone of you.)

         My sister said, "you remember as a kid when you would tell the other kids that your Dad was the biggest, fastest, and best Dad on the block?  We would have been right."  My Dad was a competitor. He loved sports and they were a big part of his life. So, in turn growing up they became a part of my life and my siblings lives as well. If you would like to see all the things my Dad did in picture form my sister made a beautiful photo slide show that you can watch. Let me warn you the first two songs are totally my Dad the last song is a tear jerker. I have to turn it down or I fall apart during that song. I love my Dad and I will miss him everyday.

            I have to tell you that these last few weeks have been really. really. really. hard. I think about my Dad a lot. I think about what I should have done with him and what I never got to do with him. I think about all the things I should have said to him. Etc, etc. All of these thoughts felt like brick after brick after brick placed on my shoulders. The physical pain of grief is very real. I have never felt it like this before ever. I realized one day that I had to make a choice. This grief that I was emotionally and physically feeling could keep me down and it could rule my life if I chose to let it. On the hand I could use this experience and make changes for the better and rise above the grief. As I thought about my choices that day I thought about a story my older brother shared with us at my Dad's funeral.

        When my older brother was in high school (it may have been earlier than this but my memory isn't that great) he started cycling with my Dad. My Dad was dang fast on the bike and on running. I think we have all wanted to beat my Dad and my older brother was proud to say that he actually had beat my Dad on the run portion of a biathlon that they were both competing in. He was so stoked. He jumped on his bike and took off for the bike portion of the race. Well, a little while later who should come zooming by?  Yep, Dad. As he passed my brother he yelled out, "shift to a higher gear!"

        Shift to a higher gear..... I have had many thoughts about these five words since that day. I knew that day that I was facing my choices what I had to do. My Dad would not want me to get lost in my grief. No way. My Dad was always my biggest fan and always cheered me on to do more. In fact in high school my Dad wrote me a letter for my high school English class and he said, "She (referring to me)  is the one in our family with the most competitive spirit of all our children. This young women is a winner and does not like to be second. She is not the kind of person that will set unrealistic goals however, but will work hard to achieve the task that she has set before herself. You sometimes have to use some gentle persuasion to get her to excel." Ahh, thanks Dad.

         So, I know what I have to do. I have to shift to a higher gear. This has so many meanings and there are so many ways to do this. In fact my mind has been flooded with thoughts about shifting to a higher gear that it's crazy. I have even had an intense thought that I am suppose to share these thoughts.  I thought it was crazy to want to share these thoughts. I talked with my husband and my sister about it and they both said go for it.So, hence the blog.  I have made a list of the things I want to do to accomplish this task and I will share them with you. I promise that I have one on this list that is totally crazy. I will need a lot of "gentle persuasion" to accomplish this task.  So, I hope you will come back and that you will share this blog with others so that we can all " shift to a higher gear," together.

Dream big and shift to a higher gear.

Corrine