A safe harbor where beliefs are respected and kindness prevails.

Amazing Restraint

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If you have a PC, have you ever looked at the “properties” section of your C drive? It will have a wonderful two-slice pie chart that indicates how much memory you have used and how much memory is available. If you haven’t saved a lot of files and have only used a little bit of memory, the pie slice will be but a sliver, and the vast majority of the pie will be the memory you have available to use.

Fotolia_59374652_Subscription_Monthly_MAlternatively, let’s say that you are getting ready to enjoy a piece of pie. You slice a teeny little sliver and leave the rest of the pie intact. This is how I see what happens on the news. The vast majority of people are kind towards their neighbors, live their lives in peace and take care of themselves and their families while a very small number of folks who act out get all of the press. Why is it that we focus on the tiny sliver of stuff that appears to be going wrong rather than put the attention on the biggest piece of the pie – all that is going well?

For example, there are dozens of Arab-Israeli peace projects going on right now – some date back to the 1940’s. Do we ever hear of them?   I say not often enough. However, what might happen if we put some real attention on the peacemakers? What might it be like if we elected to not look at the train wrecks but look at the gloriously moving trains instead? I truly enjoy acknowledging what is going right. By focusing on that, my mood improves, I smile more and I feel lighter and happier.

When I was clinically depressed and doing a lot of driving to and from work, I was all too focused on my abject misery. Yet, on many days I thought about all of the workers who helped create the freeways that I took for granted. Each second I would speed along, trusting that the road would be right there in front of me to help me get to work, or to get home. And for that, and the men who created them, I was grateful. That gratitude for the simplest things helped me weather my personal storm.

Things are really, really working well among us – in our homes, neighborhoods, and communities. How can I say this with such certainty? It occurred to me the other day that we have amazing restraint. Think about it. There are words that you can say to someone you love that could break their heart. You know their vulnerabilities and sensitivities, and you choose to protect and love them rather than hurt them. Our amazing restraint is much more common than we know. And for that, I am grateful.

It could be the most wonderful exercise to stretch your imagination in order to derive gratitude from the small things that we typically ignore. Incorporating this new habit can help you look at your challenges with renewed intention and a joyful spirit. We are more loving and kind than mean and hurtful. By focusing on the small victories, we can change how we see the world, and change our personal world in the process.

What Is Constant And What Is Moving?

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fotolia_816374_Subscription_LA friend of mine was thinking about re-painting her living room because she is not in love with the original color she selected. Although everyone she asks loves it, she was still lukewarm about it.

When we talked about it, which was often, I told her to trust her instincts and make a decision. That didn’t help because she couldn’t make up her mind and she would still talk about not totally loving the color. While listening to her, sometimes I would think, “C’mon, make a decision already.” But she wouldn’t.

As I was driving one day and thinking about how we, in general, vacillate about things (and of course I am no exception!), the light bulb went on in my head.   This is a classic example of the idea spoken by Anais Nin – “We don’t see things as they are, we see them as we are.”

My theory is that my friend’s mood is already in place when she opens her front door at the end of her workday.  And how she perceives the paint color is dependent upon her mood. When she’s in a good mood, she feels good about the paint job. When she is cranky, she doesn’t like it.

I discussed this idea with her and invited her to do an experiment: for five days she would observe what kind of mood she is in before she opens the front door, and to gauge how she feels about the paint after she opens the front door.

The results were:

Day 1 – She was tired but felt okay, the paint looked just okay.

Day 2 – She was peaceful and the paint looked pretty good.

Day 3 – She was cranky and the paint looked terrible.

Day 4 – She was happy and felt pretty good about the room.

Day 5 – She was happy and the paint job was okay.

Afterwards, she told me that this had been a beneficial exercise for her. Although overall she was okay about the paint color, she wasn’t truly in love with it. She thought that if she came home and was cranky, ideally, she wanted to be cheered up by the room. Therefore, she got the clarity she felt she needed and decided to change the paint color.

And there it was. She was true to her decision and changed the color of the paint, and she has been very happy with it ever since.

I appreciated going through that exercise with her because I learned a lot about myself as well. There were times when she talked to me about the color of the paint and I was okay with hearing about it for the umpteenth time, and other times I felt so annoyed about it. She was, at all times, being her truest self, and, it was my own mood that was the driver on how I felt about our interaction.

When I’m cranky, many things look bleak or damaged. However, when I’m feeling good and balanced, those very same things appear to be just fine. So, what is constant and what is moving? I am moving. All of the time. The thing I am thinking about, whatever it is, is existing in its truest state, and it is me who is changing. My perception is changing, based upon how I am feeling at the moment.

If you are willing, try this for yourself. First observe your mood and then notice how you feel about someone or something. Chances are your mood will impact your perception. Again, everyone and everything is just being itself and you are the one who is doing the perceiving. And based upon your mood, your perception may change.

Finally, when you find yourself happy and balanced, chances are you will be at peace with everything and everyone around you.

Funky Town Won’t Last

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JT2I was in such a funk last week. My consistent mindset of gratitude and enjoying each moment had eluded me. It’s like something clicked that got me out of my usually balanced and optimistic self.

All week I immersed myself in the energy of impatience. The things I want to achieve, while in motion, aren’t happening fast enough, or so I thought. I felt like because what I think I want hasn’t happened yet, then I need to do more, need to work harder, need to do something different.

Living in that energy last week — by concentrating on the idea that “things aren’t working,” I truly manifested that. Things didn’t work. My relationships weren’t as flowing and enjoyable as usual. My sleep was interrupted and less rejuvenating. My mind was spinning in different directions.

By the end of the week, the energy it took for me to remain in a heightened state of dissatisfaction had wiped me out! In my state of exhaustion, I finally threw up my hands and surrendered. All I can say is, “Thank goodness.” When I surrendered, my spinning mind slowed down. And when it did, my usually balanced and optimistic self reemerged, like going outside to greet the sun after a heavy storm.

I learned a lot from my impatience immersion week. I realized that my impatience took me out of the power of living in the moment. Being impatient suggested that my life is out of balance, and it isn’t. Everything is perfect, exactly as-is.

The mindset of allowing things to be okay exactly as-is, and living in the moment keeps me in my body. It keeps me calm and joyous and connected to love. I had so immersed myself in the mindset of impatience, I cut off the love. When I cut off the love, I don’t function well at all for it is the love that fuels me.

When I stopped spinning for a moment, I asked myself the following questions. When I did, I started feeling better, almost immediately:

  1. What have I accomplished while being impatient? How did it serve me exactly as-is?
  2. What will I enjoy once I get what I want? Can I feel it now, even for a split second instead of waiting?
  3. What is working really well for me today (or, what’s going well today?)
  4. Would I want to replace what is going well in my life right now with that other thing?

If you find yourself living in Funky Town when thinking about yesterday or tomorrow, it means that your own voice has jumped out of your body and the critical voice has taken charge. When you find that this is the case, ask yourself one or two of the above questions and watch your mind spin for a minute. Don’t sugarcoat anything or pretend; allow yourself to spin – it is like riding an ocean wave. It won’t last, and it will resolve itself! You can then feel yourself coming back home inside yourself.

Keep in mind that your Higher Self is in control and knows what is best for you. Understand that your life is a perfect reflection of your inner world. If something isn’t present that you would like to have present, trust and honor that. There are gifts in the moment that you have yet to unwrap.

One of my favorite lyrics by the band U2 comes from their song “It’s a Beautiful Day.” The line goes, “What you don’t have you don’t need it now.” I invite you to use that phrase as a gentle reminder to yourself whenever you find yourself anxious, worried, or out of the present moment.

Know that everything is okay, right here and right now. If nothing changes, you are okay and will continue to be okay. You can especially feel it when you remain in your good thoughts and acknowledge your sense of well-being. Allow your mindset of gratitude to keep you in the moment.

And finally, to the question of would you want to replace what is going well in your life right now with something that doesn’t yet exist physically … feel good now. Enjoy what is working in your life right now, and believe that you don’t have to choose … it is possible for you to have it all!

Watching The News

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Huey Lewis and the ____…

I can count on one hand the newscasts I have watched in the past two decades. I haven’t consistently watched the news since 1991 when my sole purpose in life was to stay on the planet. Because I was ((((thisclose)))) to saying “adios” by my own hand, I had to, very consciously, make the commitment to myself to live.  In order to do that, I shut out the world, pretty much, to focus on my own healing process.

And what a process it was. Turns out, I didn’t need the news (or television for that matter) at all; my personal programming – riddled with internal mayhem and toxic experiences — was plenty entertaining all by itself! In fact, the goings on in my head needed my attention for a long time. I had preferred to distract myself with others’ fiction and non-fiction stories rather than focusing on my own.

Paying attention to myself and my own needs paid off in countless ways. For one, I came to realize that after watching a news program I was more depressed and scared than I was when it started. That wasn’t good for me. As sensitive as I am, I require lots of love and support, which I learned to give to myself, and I am peaceful and balanced now, rather than depressed and scared. I keep it that way by focusing on things that I find joyous, fun and empowering.

You may feel otherwise about watching a news program; you may not feel like jumping afterwards like I do. However, if you find that you seek more peace, a sense of tranquility or balance in your life in general, here are a few suggestions that can help you do that:

  1. Be willing to spend to quality time with yourself, just to check in. Let it be okay that you think how you think. Releasing judgment is key.
  1. Focus on your experiences in a different way: check in with yourself on how you feel before you watch a particular program, meet with certain people or engage in a specific activity. Afterwards, check in again. Do you feel better, lighter, happier or more empowered?
  1. Do more of what empowers you and less of what depletes you!

You may be surprised by what you will learn about yourself as you shift your focus from worldly matters to personal ones. You may find your inner landscape more lush and beautiful than a rain forest, and the rewards of a deepening personal connection to be satisfying beyond words. By checking in with yourself and becoming your own best cheerleader, you will find that there is no one on the planet more beautiful – or newsworthy–than you!

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