Words of Green

Official website for author Tammy Green

Great Dane

The Book Is Here!

by Leave a Comment

Living Without Skin: Everything I Never Knew About Fierce Vulnerability is finally here! Click on Buy the Book in the banner above to get your copy today, or find it anywhere books are sold!

Feeling vulnerable is frightening.
Being fiercely vulnerable is phenomenal.

Most of us spend a lifetime trying to avoid pain and insecurity while overlooking the power we inherently possess. What would you do differently with your life if you knew you were failsafe at birth?

If you’ve ever felt vulnerable, weak, or like a complete failure, you can transform those feelings into fierce superpowers.

Life can leave you feeling raw, naked, and skinless. Learning to live without skin can turn you into the superhero of your dreams!

Prepare for an extraordinary and sometimes humorous journey that begins with a child’s imagination and ends with an ordinary adult’s transformation on unexpected paths.

You’ll discover how embracing vulnerability can help you:
– Learn how to find and wear the skin you were created for.
– Uncover the core of your individual insecurities, and transform them into strength.
– Connect internally and externally to humanity-defining power in a personal and public environment.
– Heal from trauma so it isn’t passed to the next generation as culture.

Step out of your old skin. Be your own fierce hero.

A Little More Haphazard Blogging

by 1 Comment

It seems as good a time as any to check back in here, especially since my last post was in November, 2020. I feel pretty confident that none of us were sad to see THAT year go. As we came through the beginning of 2021, it appears many of us were just trying to find stable ground again – emotionally, spiritually, and physically. I certainly was.

I have finished writing the book, Living Without Skin. I decided to shoot for the moon when asking for endorsements, and I sent requests to Brené Brown, Glennon Doyle, and Elizabeth Gilbert. I assume we’ll be “talk-on-the-phone” friends by next year anyway, so I wanted to get a jump on building our relationships. Of course, I didn’t get a response from most. However, Brené Brown’s team actually did respond – with a PERSONAL response vs just a canned “No”. So, clearly the first signed copy will go to Brené (who will likely never know how close she came to being famous by endorsing my book).

“Hmmmm…I’ve always wanted to write a book.” Are you thinking that? Do you have a great story? Dreaming of having a different career? Thinking that writing a book must be glamorous and an ideal job? Um, no. It’s a J-O-B! Writing, in and of itself, is a lesson in slicing open your heart and bleeding all over the paper. And, unless you’re famous and you have a publishing company doing all the legwork, putting that book together and actually publishing it is WORK! So, it’s been a labor of love, and definitely a check mark on the bucket list. I am unequivocally proud of it, and of my truth that I managed to tell.

Stay tuned for more information on ordering your copy starting August 1, 2021. We’re halfway through 2021 with many of us gratefully recovering from 2020. Let’s make the last half of this year amazing! Onward.

Who inspires you to be a better human?

by 2 Comments

Who inspires you to be a better human? Is it your pastor? Your partner? A relative? Superhero? Your mom?
It’s not an easy thing to find in today’s culture in America. Inspiration? Hope? Every where we look, we see polarity. Arguments. Bullying. People who profit from and support the suffering of others. How deeply do we have to dig to find something that reminds us of the goodness of humanity in our everyday lives?
Let me tell you a story of inspiration. The story photo shown is actually a wall of canvas prints of animals. Dogs, specifically, and spirits now. They are memorialized by two people that I am privileged to know and love. I am privileged because I get to love them, and I get to learn from them each day what real love, values, morals, caring, and action looks like. All the things that most of us would like to attribute to our own religion or spirituality, these people just live every day.
The dogs include Wesley, the old man with bangs, and Patsy, the boxer with cancer, and Tater, whose back legs and hips wouldn’t let him move very far without help. There is Pops, whose tongue is perpetually dry because the lower half of his jaw is gone, and Gus Gus, whose heart wasn’t expected to function for very long. Not pictured are some of the current crew consisting of Kevin, the five legged pittie whose ears were cut too short by someone more interested in his fighting skills instead of his health, and Poo, the blind and deaf poodle dropped off because he required too much care. Also not pictured are the fur kids adopted throughout the years. There’s Jake, black lab extraordinaire; Kaya, dope on a rope who enjoys a good bag of mulch occasionally; Pepper, the gazelle disguised as a dog; Nola, the soul mate adopted during a rescue during Hurricane Katrina; Biscuit, the dog training cat; Butter, the cat who morphs into whatever you need at the moment, and countless other ferrets, snakes, mice, and rabbits.
Deb and Dave provide hospice care to elderly, sick animals that need a soft place to land on their way out of this world. For some, these people are the only soft place ever known to these animals. For all of these animals, these people give generously and lovingly from their hearts and their bank accounts. How unselfish does one have to be to fully fund, without assistance, expensive medications, food, and medical care for animals who have been thrown away essentially? How loving does one have to be to offer a home, a heart, and time to another living creature unable to fend for itself? At any given time, they nurture a minimum of three hospice animals in addition to their brood.
In addition to this, what they consider to be their life’s work, they volunteer weekly at the Humane Society loving animals that don’t have a soft place to land. They regularly transport animals from not so great situations to homes where they have a chance to be loved and cared for. Deb volunteers regularly for rescue missions with organizations, and sees situations that would break most people and render them catatonic. People like me.
I love animals. Many of us have pets that we consider family members. Our own Cora Belle, Rumi, and Bit are the family that brings constant joy to our lives on a daily basis. I know how to care for animals. I am filled with compassion, and a desire to end pain for any living creature.
But I can’t do what my better humans do. I do not have what it takes to witness the outcome of human cruelty with my own eyes, and not let it break me. I do not have what it takes to quietly take on the suffering of multiple living creatures, and emerge whole. Maybe they don’t either. Maybe they each give pieces of life from themselves to every life they touch. You won’t find a person alive who has met them, worked alongside them, or volunteered with them who doesn’t love them. There are many more out there who do what they do, quietly, willingly, without us ever knowing the cost to them. What about the people who can’t do what they do? The people like me, who just can’t. Maybe our job is to say “thank you”. Maybe our job is to hug them, and love them, and cry with them, and lift them up. Maybe we can pour into them a tiny portion of the love that they so freely give to the ones that we can’t.
Who inspires you to be a better human? Find them and say “thank you”.

How My Dog Taught Me Yoga

by Leave a Comment

“Ahdo Mukha Shvanasana”. I can’t even say it. Which is probably a good indicator that I can’t even do it. At least not properly. 

But my dog can. 

Without even practicing.

Or even thinking about it.

Downward dog. Downward facing dog. Observing a 115 pound Great Dane do this truly makes one respect the art form. Large (but not too large) and graceful, this girl puts her big bucket head flat to the ground and gets the full stretch from her harlequin hued hamstrings. This is usually followed by a massive yawn and a groan that makes me laugh out loud. We’re talking about her groans, not mine. Mine aren’t that funny.

I’m training to run my first full marathon-26.2 miles of hellfire and brimstone to my feet, legs, and body. I do long runs on the weekends because I don’t have half a day during the week to voluntarily torture myself, not to mention another day and a half to recover from it. My masseuse suggested yoga to help stretch the muscles and keep my total body limber. Enter Downward Dog. Imagine lying flat on the ground in prone position. That was my first attempt at Downward Dog. Enter MY groans. Not funny at all.

How do dogs know this? How does living a simple, joyful life come so easy to them? Are they mystical creatures sent from another dimension to teach us how to live as better humans? Is that a rhetorical question? Here are 10 truths my dog has taught me about how to live.

1. Sleeping is everything. Take every opportunity you can to sleep. It works best when you can find a nice, shady spot in which to dig a hole and form your whole body into a ball that’s hole-sized. Utilize Downward Dog stretching upon awakening.

2. Enjoy food. Once you’ve found something you like, stick with it. Don’t eat the diet stuff. Just sniff it and walk away.

3. Treats are the best! Celebrate as often as possible for as many reasons as possible. Go pee outside. Come when you’re called. Sit occasionally. Bring the ball back. Sometimes lying down gets two!

4. Let people know what you’re feeling. Don’t wait to be asked if you need to go potty. Just go put your wet nose into someone’s hand. It doesn’t matter if it’s 2:00 a.m. 

5. Do what you want. If dragging trash from the bathroom can is your thing, do it repeatedly and with passion. Don’t let the naysayers bring you down.

6. Be enthusiastic. Going for a walk? Get into it. 

7. Keep your emotions in check until the timing is appropriate. No need to display shock at the turn of events in your life until the pizza delivery guy rings the doorbell. 

8. Stay in shape. Run like the wind after the ball when it’s thrown so you can let your person know exactly where it is while you wait for her to come pick it up, or, if you’re feeling festive, FETCH it! (See # 3.)

9. Size doesn’t matter. A friend’s Chihuahua will eat your head while my Great Dane hides from butterflies.

10. Be happy. Recognize how lucky you are to have people in your life who love you unconditionally.

It’s never easy balancing health living with responsibility. So often, we are pulled in so many different directions each day with work, family, socializing, and technology. Seriously, who can find the time to train for a marathon? Finding basic joyfulness in living can be a challenge at best, and can result in health issues at worst. Whether it’s exercising, spirituality, relationships, or mindfulness, dogs can teach us so much about living our best lives. Volunteer with a local pet rescue or Humane Society to walk dogs for an hour weekly, and learn Downward Dog for life.

Dog live about 12 years, and that’s why they discovered this brilliant philosophy. Because time is limited, there is no time to be unhappy. ~Mehmet Murat