Category: Living inPASSION

One Hundred Years from Now

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by Olga Pyshnyak-Lawrence

Between chores and to-do’s, I managed to quickly slip into the Lyndon House in Athens—literally as I was driving from point A to B. My soul was seduced by a craving to do something random, something passionate, something to fill me up, even though I didn’t know why at the time.

The modern art is not my cup of tea, generally. Anybody can be an artist nowadays, that’s true, albeit not a very good one. My soul craves beauty and something long lasting…and that’s one of the reasons I love the past so much, not simply for the curious stories and historical facts, but for the care and appreciation given to beautiful and elaborate objects of admiration or daily use.

I walked quickly past the modern objects screaming on the walls and straight to the historical building attached. A reverent hush falls over me as I enter the space that housed families and generations. Their dramas and tragedies, hopes and crushed dreams… I can envision the hustle and bustle of their everyday, their stunning surroundings. This family was well off and could enjoy that extra morsel of luxury.

But what pierced my heart and soul so desperately as I looked upon the remnants of lives before me was the very painful and thought-provoking question: “What will my children or grandchildren say about me 100 years from now?” or will they say anything at all? And then, the next question begs my attention, “What do I want them to say about me?” Will anything remain of me? Will someone someday look upon the remnants of my life, the ashes of my quests, and ponder my existence?

What will I leave behind to the generations that are to come? What legacy will survive after I am long gone? Of course, I’ve rambled down the less traveled road…and so I mused…

One day, I will die and this is not a thought we contemplate often, but perhaps one should… To live a life worth living, one must do it knowing it will all end one day. We do not hold forever captive. Occasionally, one must revisit the unconscious priorities programmed into our daily systems.

What do you want YOUR children and grandchildren to say about you 100 years from now? Or should you even care?

I do.

In fact, I care very deeply. And this forces me to revisit my list and rankings of priorities in my life.

I want my children and my grandchildren to say:

  • – She truly lived boldly
  • – Danced to her own convictions
  • – And in the process of setting others free, she liberated herself

Everything I do, I teach my children to do the same, consciously or subconsciously.

And they will do the same with their very own.

And here is the grand idea. Do you realize that you, yes you, sitting down right now at your table, on your couch, wherever the heck you may be, you are directly connected to the generations coming after you? What is the inheritance you leave behind?

I want my grandchildren and great grandchildren and so forth, to live BOLDLY, DANCE to their own convictions, and BE FREE.

In essence, I want them to BE FREE to DANCE BOLDLY. That is the inheritance I will leave behind.

And between now and then, I will show them the way, teach them how it’s done.

It Takes a Village

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By Olga Pyshnyak-Lawrence

Sometimes, the most meaningful stories don’t make it to the front page. I wrote this article for a local newspaper last spring, but it was never published. The message, however, has only grown more true with time. I’m honored to finally share it here, and I hope it speaks to your heart as it did to mine.

It’s been almost two years since we moved to Danielsville, GA, a sweet, small town with homestyle values and a lot of hope. The people I’ve encountered have brought a fresh sense of curiosity into my life.

I love the expansive fields that I see every time I leave Athens to the place, now, I call home. I feel myself begin to relax and take bigger breaths as I let go of the city and embrace the countryside.

I’ve been known to say on plenty of occasions that what you get out of a place or community is directly proportional to what you put in yourself. It’s been a habit for me since I’ve been a high schooler, to insert myself into the fabric of society, to find meaning in giving back, grateful for every scrap of learning I received, trusting and hoping that everything I’ve done would not be just for the benefit of the recipient but also an investment into myself, into a vision of a much better and wiser person that I would imagine myself to be sometime in the far-away future.

It takes a village to raise a child, to develop the adult and to nourish the old…

It’s become clearer to me recently, as I’ve diligently studied my environment, that Madison County is no ordinary place. Every time that I join in on the monthly meetings, set up by Sherry Deakin (MART/Madison County Family Connection Coordinator), that connect various movers and shakers in our area, I am thrilled and inspired to see such eagerness and response to the needs of our community. And yes, Our community, as I’ve claimed my new home and hope to settle down here and finally build roots that I’ve only dreamed of as an immigrant.

These wonderful people represent various groups and organizations who keenly feel the needs of many demographics, from the youngest to the oldest, from the healthy to the less fortunate. The problems facing them are all the same: time and money, money and time. It never gets old.

The issues of the youth are pressing on my heart more and more daily…

I watch my children and wonder what the world will be like for them. There is a gap between the generations that I am very desperate to bridge. I sat today, having breakfast with my graduating Mentee, hosted by the Madison County Mentorship program, organized by Renee McCannon, listening to the stories around me, taking in that said Village, Mentors and Mentees, both learning together and from each other; a symbiotic relationship.

As I sub within the Madison County School system, I am constantly reminded that the schools cannot face the burden of educating our “future” alone and preparing them to be what we expect them to be: contributing members of our society. I look at the eager faces and some not so eager, and I wonder what Village is behind them. Do they even have a Village, a support system that can hold them up when they are falling? That Village is birthed at home, nurtured in the neighborhoods as they step outside, and developed by the institutions within that child’s sphere of habitation.

And yet again, at the high school, over pizza and salad from Mellow Mushroom, sponsored by one of those said movers and shakers who are so eager to help the community and to educate the students about help available to them, I am saddened to hear that there is not enough funding, nor volunteers to help carry out this valuable outreach to the students.

There are many hands and hearts available, but not enough time nor funding to do what this Village requires.

And herein lies the question, do we rely too much on the aforementioned organizations and not enough on our very own selves? Has it become more comfortable for us to outsource our responsibilities to others? As a life coach, my goal is to teach the client to fish, not to hand them the fish. Before I digress into a million shards of thought and opinion, let me be clear, I don’t pretend to have the answers, but I am willing to listen as I traverse this uncomfortable terrain of what-could-be’s and should-be’s.

I am empowered and inspired by the creative people who are making a difference within the Village I live in. I am astounded at the number of nonprofits, endeavors, and private citizens who serve Madison County! There is so much hope for the future! I am motivated to keep doing my part, not only because that’s something I’ve always done, but because I am finally in the presence of the like-minded.

As a poet and a writer, I know the value, the depth and gold that words can carry. Words can change lives, embolden destinies, shape our character and uplift communities. Every person in our Village has the potential to alter someone else’s world, and in doing so, inspire change and bring hope to our collective future.

Words are free.

The beauty of words is that they not only affect the receiver, but also the giver.

As the issues of my Village are pressing on my heart more and more daily, I draw closer to my faith, believing that we all must bloom where we are planted. God cultivates us in our spaces for a reason. We are like glorious flowers in His garden.

And so, I choose to see us all as wondrous beings, infused with the divine, full of possibilities. Every person I encounter has the ability to change me. To make me greater. Better. Wiser. We are the representatives of Our Village.

We can make a difference regardless of where we find ourselves. We don’t need money or much time to carve out an opportunity to say a kind word, or just simply smile.

As I dwell here in Madison County, engaging in my own Village, supporting and being supported, I am excited to leave a mark, and one day, leave this world a little bit better.

Let’s get busy today… together!

Simpler Times; a quest for whimsy and fairytales amidst the modern-day chaos

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Maya, my delightful sprite of a daughter, loves stopping by the little free libraries on the sides of the streets, wherever we are. They are a source of new information that carries the potential to make her life a little bit better. You just never know what you may discover! Each time, as she eagerly opens the little door, she is excited as if she were searching for precious gemstones. She loves picking out books for herself as well as for her little brother Mikey. She rarely forgets to choose something for him as well.

This time, with a bit of my help and prodding, “we” chose a few classics. One of them was a children’s adaptation of the book Little Women. Goodness, God knows how much I enjoyed this book and many other classics when I was a kid! I was ecstatic! This was my opportunity to start introducing her to literary works that gave me so much joy, hour upon hour.

I used to hide myself within a story, letting go of all the hardships of life, of all the bullying because I was different, primarily for simply being a girl from another country; a little Ukrainian that dressed funny.

Great stories were a lifeline to me. Adjusting to a different country was fraught with complications and misunderstandings. Mostly, I felt that the kids were afraid of me because I wasn’t born in the States, as if I were an alien in human form.

Needless, to say, books became my best friends. They never threatened me, and I could be wherever and whenever that the books took me.

But I digress, as I often tend to do in my blogs as I travel down the memory lane…

I couldn’t wait to start reading to Maya, 6 and Michael, 3, the story of the Little Women. If you don’t know this book, look it up right now! That afternoon, we proceeded to indulge ourselves in a story that had its setting in a time and place very different to our own, hundreds of years ago…and yet we could connect to it because we all experienced the growing pains every child must go through as they discover their voice, their identity, and their power.

As I looked deep inside myself to process why I was so desperate that Maya would connect with this book… I glimpsed my own desperation to connect to a time that represented simplicity … even though, paradoxically, the book started off by introducing us to Mr. March, the father, who was away at war.

The chaos of the last month, the war in Ukraine has been affecting me personally, as I have family in Ukraine. The emotional stress, on top of the physical stress I’ve been experiencing recently, almost drove me to a breaking point a few days ago. There has been so much information saturating my atmosphere that I had to choose to protect myself from that bombardment on most days. Ergo, the need for simpler times, a desperate craving really, has been brewing within me and was exposed by this children’s book.

Books have magical powers… They connect us with the whimsical, a fairytale-like state. They can bring us back to our inner selves and our deepest desires.

So, what did I learn from this deep dive into my soul? To me, Simpler Times represent not only the connection to whimsy and having the space to imagine and create, but also the dusting off the values that had the ability to carry so much weight in my present state, a prescription for my personal healing. So, as I dive deep into understanding and creating Simpler Times in my current, often chaotic, life, I will be prioritizing the values of Fancy, Freedom, Movement, Exhilaration, Dreams, Easy Beauty, Vision, Sparkle, Delight, Joy, Faith, Belief, Justice, Adventure, Fairy tales and Florals.

As I mine deep within my life for these precious gems, I hope as well, that I find that connection to all the women of passion that came before me, are here now, and will come after me. Women of Vision and Whimsy, women that create magic no matter where they find themselves, no matter the wherever and whenever.

As I build upon what was once discovered, I hope to add to what will once be discovered by generations coming after me. And so I hope and pray, that my children will add that bit of sparkle to the ones around them, as I engage them within a story that was written long ago, hopefully never to be forgotten, always ready to be enjoyed, as what is precious and beautiful must never be lost as it navigates the turbulent times and chaotic events.

Wherever you find simplicity, may it often grace your homes and hearts. Your quest may be different to mine, but passion is what I hope we can agree upon. Without passion, we are not moved.

May you have lots of passion to pursue what you truly need at this moment. May you find your own Simpler Times as you escape into the whimsy and the fairy tale of your own making!

~by Olga Pyshnyak-Lawrence

Fiercely Feminine

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I don’t want to give credit to this horrible pandemic, but even in the midst of the muck and mire I’ve been blessed to learn a lesson or two. 

During this time, although many things have stalled and are standing still, age just keeps creeping up on you. That will never stand still.  It is something I cannot control or manipulate. It just is. Time passes. We get older. I just turned 38. Nearing 40. Almost a midlife crisis on my hands, I slightly fear. 

By this time in my life I thought I would achieve something grand, phenomenal, life altering, life changing for many. 

This is where I assumed in my blissful ignorance, life projects upwards at an exponential degree, where all your efforts are paid off and you reap the benefits of your bloody sweat. 

But as of right now, from a casual observer’s perspective, I am just simply ordinary. And that frightens me. I’ve never wanted to be ordinary, I always attempted to stand out growing up, even through some crazy outfit choices… One of the greatest compliments I’ve received was sometime in middle school, when a girl that sought to hurt me said, “You are so weird.” Goodness, I treasure those words until now! The worst thing you can tell me is that I am just like everyone else, retiring, blending in, scared to make a wrong move, causing me to stand out in the firing line of eager criticism. 

And so, in the last few months, amidst the debris of many non starts and failed enterprises, as I’ve taken stock of my achievements over the years, I found myself re-evaluating my standing in the world and my conditioning and perceptions, and I’ve decided to dig deep and find the true core of myself. I needed to talk to my most inner being and find out what I truly wanted and valued at this time in my life. Perhaps I had to let go of certain aspirations that only deceived me or distracted me from the truly valuable in my life. 

I was happy and uncomfortable to find out that I was willing to burn everything on the altar of Motherhood. 

Growing up, mothers around me, in my Slavic, super fundamentalist culture, were second class citizens, put aside by culture to serve the men and children, servants of no importance but of performance in the home. If they didn’t think for themselves, even better. Men looked down upon them. It was horrible. It was everything I didn’t want to be. These women had very little self-worth, and as girl growing up in that society, I felt I had no value or place there. The only reason I went to the University was because I had scholarships, and everything was paid for and as an acceptable excuse- in case my husband dies and I have to work outside the home. God forbid. 

Perhaps I am sharing too much, but I believe if you understand where I’ve been, you will understand where I’m going. 

So here I am, coming to terms that I could possibly be happy and content to be just a mother to my 3 and 6 year old and just a wife to my loving husband. That I could be…just that. That I don’t have to be anything outside of the role I am playing right now to be happy. That I don’t need all those accolades and acceptance of my intelligence and uniqueness from anyone else, not even my parents. I love them, but they are who they are, and I cannot mold them into whom I would prefer them to be. I cannot stretch their limitations, as I cannot do the same with my own. 

And guess what? I realized that one can find happiness in being a housewife. Yep, that blew my mind as well. Grass is always greener on the other side. When we couldn’t participate in one world, years ago, we wanted it. And now, thank God, some are lucky to have that choice. 

I am blessed to be a housewife. To have that time to look after my sweet home and my sweet kids and my almost always sweet husband. And you know, to start becoming a little vain again. 

I want to feel like a woman. Fiercely Feminine. 

I want to give myself the permission to be unapologetically immersed in this phase in my life, haters be damned. They can laugh at the joy I experience of looking after my home (when I can- hey I am not going to spend too much time at the expense of blissing out with my kids!), my struggling attempts to carve out time for spa moments at home, with eager attempts to hold onto my beauty and fashion faux pas. I want to look after my kids with deeper compassion and to be a better friend to my husband with unconditional love. 

I want to find that joy in looking after myself again. To carve out more time for makeup and hair tutorials and actually using a body balm to keep the rest of my skin glistening even if no one else sees it, just for me! All these things I’ve done in my less attached years, before I got married and had kids. 

I want to be grand just for me.

And so, after giving myself permission to stop seeking, but to enjoy what I’ve already found, I’ve become in touch with that next level of bliss that I innately craved. I now spend a little more intentional time with my kids, not because I feel I have to, but because it is something I really love to do. I love my kids and there is nothing I would prefer more than to be with them, playing, learning about the world and seeing the wonder of it all through their eyes. 

And I am writing again! Just because it is something I always loved to do. It is not a waste of time, but pure delight … pure blissful delight. 

By this time in my life, I thought I would achieve something grand, phenomenal, life altering, life changing for many…

And I have. Perhaps not life changing for many, but life changing for the ones around me… as I am now able to be truly, unapologetically me. 

And that is unapologetically, delightfully, blissfully Fiercely Feminine! 

Here’s to all the Mothers and Wives out there! 

Please enjoy a 25 % off discount on any of my oils and books in celebration of my latest creation, Fiercely Feminine! A scent to which you can bliss out all day long, and when they ask you what that scent is, you can say, “It’s me, baby. All woman.”

Use code FIERCELYFEMININE on most items in the shop, or on https://www.etsy.com/listing/1142069129/fiercely-feminine-for-facehairbody-oil.

~by Olga Pyshnyak-Lawrence

Blooming Under Pressure

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It’s been an interesting time… Well, that’s a sore understatement for many and a grateful statement for others. It hasn’t been a perfect time, that’s for sure.

Friends are losing friends, and not because of COVID, but because of ideologies that differ, and therefore they cannot come together in the same space.

It has been a sad time. A happy time. A time of growth and internal struggle. A time of counting your blessings in the midst of what appears to be, more and more, a designed chaos to prove a point rather than an organic outcome of unfortunate events.

Truth has become murky and trust has been an outdated commodity. Whom CAN YOU TRUST?

Churches are weak. Some are strong. Most are indifferent and impervious to change, ready to just quit on this Earth and move to Heaven pronto.

Look, this article of mine is not for the weakhearted. It is not for the one that cannot process and take time to learn… If you are reactionary and trigger happy, this article will not be pleasing to you at all. You may hate my guts, call me ignorant or a Bible thumper. Who knows? All I know is I can write. So, write, I must.

Somewhere in the last few years, a surprise to myself and perhaps the rest of my family, I have become a True Patriot of America. Now, I am not going to belabor you with my personal definition of a true patriot. To each his own, I am sure. There will always be someone else foaming at the mouth, ready to tear it to shreds. All I can say is that I love America, I love this land and even these people who may hate me because of preconceived notions they’ve eagerly swallowed by the polarized media.

Watch what feeds you. Perhaps disconnect yourself from the feeding tubes and see what opinions YOU may have. Trust me, they aren’t smarter than you are… YOU can make your OWN decisions.

I don’t want to be pigeonholed into a political stance. I am much more and much greater than either one of those parties. And so are you. How can two labels describe a myriad of positions and millions of people? Just because I regard some issues as truth does not mean that I want to tack on the full weight of a movement. For a moment here, allow me to call myself an independent.

Isn’t that true freedom? To be independent from other people’s agendas?

Blooming under pressure means something different to everyone under the sun. And that’s how it should be. We are all different. God never designed us to be all the same. He delights in our differences.

That does not mean we are to be a rambling mess without a course or a plan as a collective. We must travel in the same direction to achieve progress for the common good. What I mean by that is that we have to share the same values to get ahead. Right now, we have become a two-headed dragon, pulling itself into two altogether separate directions, straining at the seams to hold itself together, breathing fire at its very own body.

Useless. Waste of energy and resources at the expense of our own people.

I am sick of the lies that separate us. Let’s form a foundation on which we all can stand. If the head is rotten, let’s ourselves unite on common ground of what is good and what is necessary for our country to thrive. Forget the country, if that’s too much of a stretch for you. Let’s make it personal.

Let’s bring it home. What is necessary to make YOUR family thrive? Probably that’s exactly what everybody else’s family needs. How about we pursue those sentiments? Can we define the values that we share on this issue?

Hey, I am pretty sure, your family, as much as mine, needs stability, protection, peace, unity, provision, and acceptance. In pursuit of these, let us not fight. This is not a child’s sandbox at the playground. Can we treat each other kindly no matter our differences? Violence is not a long-term solution.

If you have something against another, be a grownup, confront them with decorum, don’t blast them online in front of others. You only make yourself look bad. Nope, you haven’t won. You’ve simply lost your dignity. Is that how you want to present yourself to your children? Out of control, weak and immature?

Where’s your wisdom?

And now, let’s dive into that a little bit…

Wisdom.

Lately I’ve seen children in grown up bodies ransacking their own villages and plundering their own homes. Silly. And I’m not talking about the violent BLM movement. I’m using a metaphor here to cover all sectors of life. Yep, most of them haven’t been potty trained at all. We cannot wear diapers forever, brothers and sisters.

It’s time to grow up. I understand, accidents will happen occasionally. But we cannot make it the new normal to just let the mess fester on our carpets.

It is time to clean up our own house.

Look past the deception that now this mess is a part of us and akin to something decorative.

And since this is MY written piece and ‘I can cry if I want to’ …

What happened to the basic values that everyone understood as good? Nowadays, if you are pro family, you are a conservative. Pro peace, yep, conservative. Pro constitution, jeez, total loony conservative.

The more I hear the noise against conservatism, the more I want to become one! The more they scream hate, the more I want to love. The more they say, don’t buy, the more I want to buy!

Goodness, must be that scary rebel in me. Thank God, I am not setting houses on fire, although I’ve got plenty of fire in me.

Folks, make up your own mind. Don’t let the fringes dictate and lie to you that there is no other way. There is always a way.

I think we are ready to uproot the notions and the lies that we cannot live together in harmony. We CAN be a part of a beautiful diverse fabric that loves and thrives together because we are all unique in our commonness.

The fools at the top, we see right through you. You are scared for the rights you stole from us and the privilege you’ve cloaked yourself with. You just want us to fight, fight, fight and make ourselves blind in our rage so we don’t notice what you’ve been doing to us and our families.

I am pro-America. Pro-family and pro-people. If the leaders cannot lead, we must be the leaders in our own communities. And if you have no more love nor the heart to lead with integrity-RESIGN.

Move on.

That will be the most Patriotic Act you ever do.

And now, thank you all for having read thus far.

I trust you are well. That you are good and kind.

Be nice.

I am a mother to small kids and that’s something I tell them constantly.

Let me remind you – you are a stunning human being – capable of so much goodness.

And let’s smile … Come on. It won’t hurt a bit.

What’s happening to you?

You are just blooming under pressure.

by Olga Pyshnyak- Lawrence

Ever so Humble, and ever so Proud- a current day Patriot.