August 6, 2007: You done good, Ma!

You done good Ma. I’m changing the world, if only on a “small” scale right now (over 1030 students so far and growing). I have done the thing you and dad advised against — when I was young I wanted to be both an engineer and a teacher and unintentionally, I have become both. I combined that with self expression, artistry and meditation as well as entrepreneurialship and voila — here I am 5 years later, world renown, running the premier poi fire/flow dancing school that has been around the longest and, to the best of my knowledge, the only full time one around in the world today.

You undeniably made me who I am — in all the ways you encouraged and discouraged me. All the ways I fought you taught me; all the ways I listened to you taught me as well.

I feel grateful that you’re my Mother. You’re an amazing woman who is a ground breaking individual in her own right. I hope you know that is how I hold you in the world. You often inspire me.

I hope when you think of me you’re not too embarrassed by how weird/unusual I am. When I tell you that it is a gift in more people’s lives than you could count, I mean it. I have countless stories of how the mindset of and the school has changed people’s lives (have you ever read the Flowology Mindset?). One of my favorites is about how one of my students walked into her synchronized swim team meeting and one of her teammates who didn’t know about the Temple from her found the mindset on line and printed it out, asking the coach of the team to use it as a guideline for how they all played together. How cool is that to be putting it out on the internet and have some random person ask another person to use it as the official team philosophy?

I guess my point in all of this is that as I’ve written my will, I’ve reflected on all the times where we have not always seen eye to eye. Despite it all and in many ways because of it, I am who I am and where I am. Your clear and undeniable contribution to me being who I am spreads through the world as my work avails itself to more and more clients each day.

So I thank you for the gift it has been for me both in my own life and in the way I get to share it with other’s in their lives.

I imagine in the great ether of the universe we (the soul) may choose the parents whose lives we come into. I wonder why I choose (if in fact that happened) you and Dad sometimes — I often feel like my relationship with the family makes no sense.

But when I look at it through the eyes of the clarity of my work ethic, commitment to excellence, strength of will, leadership capabilities, brilliant mind, cognitive development, reasoning skills and the profound sense that it doesn’t matter what stands in my way I will make it happen, I’m clear much of that in me is a result of who and how you and Dad have been in my life.

So thanks. Which seems like such a small thing to say in response to all you’ve given to me. But sometimes appreciation, even this small, means something. And I wanted you to have that since hey, one never knows when the end will come.

Love love love!
The daughter (formerly known as) Lisa. :)