Through The Storms

Life is not always full of sunny days.  Into all of our lives rain will fall, storms will blow, cold and darkness will come.  At these times we must not fear, we must relax and go with the flow, let the the rain fall, the the storm blow, embrace the darkness and see that behind the rain clouds the sun still shines, underneath the stormy winds lies peace and calm, inside the cold and darkness the warmth and light still lives. Let the rains wash over us, let the winds blow us clean, let the cold and darkness bathe us in complete stillness, then as we see through the rain, storms and darkness we will once again remember the light.

Receiving End

Do you ever look around your life and suddenly feel like you are always willingly reaching out to others, but no one is really reaching out to help you?  Are you the one who offers hope, support and encouragement, the one who calls up to check in on others or drops a quick line just to say...hey thinking about you.  Have you gone out of your way many times to get together with others, but these others don't seem to have the time or energy to make it to you?  If you are noticing this, you are probably a giver.

There's nothing wrong with being a giver, the problem comes when you begin to realize that you are the one doing all of the giving.  How do we handle it when we need something and it feels as if no one is there for us?  How do we handle it when we look and suddenly realize how lopsided many of our relationships are?  Do we become angry and resentful and stop giving to anyone.  We could, but that probably wouldn't make us feel too great or really solve anything, would it?

I guess the first place to start would be to look and see what exactly we are putting out there in our relationships.  Are we willing to accept help from others when they offer it?  Do we come across as never needing or wanting help from anyone?  Do we ask for help and then accept the help we receive or are we critical or off putting in our attitude towards the help offered?  Do we struggle to accept help because we feel weak or helpless when we take help? Do we fear taking help because if we take help, we will somehow lose some bit of control that we feel that we have?  Do we even recognize when we need help?

I've come to realize through personal experience that how we ourselves ask for and receive help makes a big difference in what we receive from others.  Usually when I was able to recognize that I need help and then I asked for help openly and honestly, I received help, if I accepted the help willingly without being critical of what I received or trying to control the help I received, then the next time I needed help, the help was quickly and graciously given.

I was used to doing many things for myself and feeling that I had to be strong and take care of everyone else, but I was not good at asking for help or accepting help when offered.  Part of the lesson of having a chronic illness for me has been in learning how to ask for help and more importantly how to receive help when it's offered.  I've also learned that learning to recognize when we need help, being able to ask for it and then graciously receive it is not a weakness, it's a strength.  If I benefit so much for helping others, why would I deny that benefit to those who desire to help me?  Help may not always come in the way we imagined or expected, but that doesn't mean it's not useful or beneficial to us.  If we wrap ourselves up in expectations of what help should look like, we may miss out on something really amazing that we had no way of envisioning.

Perhaps if we find ourselves feeling as if we are only on the giving end, it's time for us to look at our own receiving habits and make some adjustments.  Of course we will find that there are those around us who really are only there to take what we have to offer and don't really have much to offer back, but I think we will also find there are many out there who are just waiting to lend a hand in whatever way they know how.

Perhaps it's time to open up our hearts, souls and minds to the idea of receiving.

Just Perfect

This post came to me while I was picking up my house and doing laundry this afternoon...I find that a lot of my thinking and understandings come when I am doing simple, mindless tasks, that's probably why a lot of them are related to cleaning.

I am sure we have all had a friend who we view as perfect.  We see them and want to be like them.  They invite us to their house and their house appears spotless, they show up for lunch and their hair, make up, clothing seems perfect.  Sometimes we struggle to be like them, we wonder how they can be like that and why we seem to struggle a long barely getting anything done.  We love, respect and admire our perfect friend.

Then one day we stop by unannounced at our friend's house, she answers the door looking uncomfortable.  Her hair is a mess, she's wearing no mask of makeup, she's got sweats on.  She reluctantly invites you in and her house looks like a whirlwind went through, dishes in the sink, laundry waiting to be folded on the couch, a dusty bunny floats by as you sit down on the chair.

Your friend is uncomfortable and embarrassed, but you are happy and excited, not because you caught them off guard and ruined their facade, but because you realize that this person you love and so admire is just like you, they aren't perfect, they aren't wonder woman,  they've just always presented their very best side to you.  You still love your friend and respect her and want to be like her, but now you realize you don't have to be perfect, you don't have to strive to always have everything in place, that you only have to be the best YOU you can be, that even those who may appear "perfect" are really just the same as you, we all have dustbunnies and hidden messes stashed under and in the couches and closets of our lives.

It's always great when we come to the realization that we don't have to be our idea of "perfect" or somebody else's idea of perfect, we simply have to do the best we can with what we have.  It's OK to hang out in sweats and not comb our hair, its' OK to do up our hair and dress our best when we feel like it.  It's all about finding balance, having respect for ourselves and taking care of ourselves, not about being in some kind of competition to be perfect.  We can learn from messiness just as much as we can learn from perfection, it all has a lesson for us to learn, so don't be afraid of either one...just relax, embrace yourself and all that you are and know that you are deeply loved no matter how "perfect" or not "perfect" you are!

Tending Your Own Garden

Living a life in service to others is very important to many of us, but we have to keep in mind that part of serving others is remembering to take care of ourselves.  Sometimes we need to step back from holding everyone else and take time to nurture ourselves. We don't always have to hold everyone and their needs above our own.  If we don't take care of ourselves, we won't be able to take care of anyone else and everyone loses.

We also need to keep in mind that we don't have to hold the problems of the world by ourselves.  There are many  here to help us and if we will ask for help and allow others to help us, we are giving them the gift of allowing them to serve us.  

Remember, it's important to water your own garden as well as others and there are plenty of gardeners who are ready and willing and would be honored to help you tend your plants.

Core Beliefs

One of my friends was recently talking with me about what her core beliefs are.  I listened intently to what she told me and then our conversation moved on to other topics.  Later, as often happens with me, the idea of core beliefs being circling through my head.  I wondered what my core beliefs are.  I decided to sit quietly and go to the very center of myself and find what lies there that is never changing for me.  What  I discovered on my inner journey is that as I've grown and been exposed to different understandings, ideas, beliefs or doctrines, my own beliefs have shifted or changed.

 It makes sense that our beliefs would change if we understand that one of the definitions of the word belief is that it is a conviction of the truth of some statement or the reality of some being or phenomenon especially when based on examination of evidence.  Many times through out our lives we believe things that are based on no evidence or little evidence and many times we believe in some evidence that has been produced only to find new evidence discrediting the old evidence.

What I discovered for myself while looking deeply at all of this is that my beliefs do not make me who I am, they are merely ideas and understandings formed on evidence I've been presented with through out my life time, through life experiences, through the teachings of others, through books, schools, teachers, pastors, through all kinds of sources.

What I have believed has been formed from many things outside of me, what I know however, comes from deep within me and there is only one thing that I know that has not changed and that is that I belong to God and I wish only to return to that which I belong to.  This is the core of who I am.  This is the never changing constant in my life that will always guide me no matter what beliefs or understandings I am presented with through out my life time.

Taking Care of Our Own

Someone recently made the comment to me that we should take care of our own.  I agree, we should take care of our own.  But who do we consider our own?  Is it just the people in our immediately family?  Is it our extended family?  Our community, our state, our country?  Does our own include our relatives who still live in the lands where our ancestors migrated from?  And what about the areas where all of our ancestors have lived?  Do we think we originated here and that our only responsibility to the world is to take care of the people we are connected to?  How many of us would be living where we live right now if none of our ancestors would have ever migrated.  Where would we ALL be if Moses had never left the promised land?  Am I the only one who thinks like this?  Am I the only one who sees that deep down we are all basically connected, that no matter what our beliefs, location, race, social status, that underneath we all originated from the same source.

I literally cringe when I hear of any human in pain, not just "one of my own", any human suffering feels wrong to me.  Recently the news made a big deal out of 2 Americans being declared dead in Japan.  My heart cried out...why should we be more concerned over these two than the other thousands.  Is one human life worth more than another just because of where they happened to be born?

I love my country, I feel blessed to have been born here, I was raised by a man who's parents worked hard to migrate to this country, my own great grandfather migrated to this country, my dad fought in WW II to defend this country, so I do understand the importance of being where I am, but I don't feel that being an American makes me more important or higher than any other human on this planet.

As long as we continue to see ourselves as separate, as long as we use our beliefs, our race, our location, our gender, anything at all to separate out one human from another, the more difficult it will be for our world to truly live in love and find peace.  As long as there are people on this planet who aren't able to provide the necessities of life for their families, there will be a need to rise up. As long as anyone is using their power in any manner to harm and control others there will be suffering and war.  If we can understand that we are all one and work towards having the basic needs of every one of us met, then we can find what we say we all long for and that is peace.

Once we can look out at the world and see that everything we see is a part of us and with this understanding we  take care of our own, then the rest will begin to fall into place.  It's that simple.

Be Who You Are

Who are we really?  Who have we been?  Who do we want to be?  How do we become all that we were meant to be?  These are questions I think we've all asked at some point.  I often wonder if people are seeking to become who they are meant to be or if they are simply trying to become someone else.  It's great to look to others as mirrors of how we want to be in the world or don't want to be in the world, but should we want to actually become someone else, or should we seek to become the best us we can be?  Do we want to be a reflection of someone else or do we want to be our authentic self?

It would seem to me that we should strive to bring the best of our self to the surface rather than merely imitating the image of another. If others truly serve as a mirror to us reflecting what we like and don't like about ourselves, wouldn't it make sense then that instead of looking to the reflection we should be looking within our self to see who we want to be?  Instead of merely repeating words of others all of the time shouldn't we be finding our own words.  Instead of acting out what we see others act out, shouldn't we be forming our own role to play?

I watched a Ninja type movie once where the wise old man imparted this wisdom,  "Take the truth and make it your own."  I think of this statement whenever I hear someone simply repeating quotes from other sources.  I think to myself, "Those are beautiful words, but what do YOU think?"  Shouldn't we be discovering what we think and who we really are rather than simply parroting others and trying to fill a role someone else is already playing?

Many of us have similar roles to play, but it would seem more beneficial to take those roles and make them our own rather than acting them out in a manner that someone else is already using.  Not that it's a bad thing to have role models or follow the example of others, but we should be ourselves, not strive to be someone else.

Perhaps we should use our energy to look within ourselves and find our own gifts and present those to the world in our own style instead of looking outside of ourselves to see who we want to be.  We aren't in a competition with each other to fill a role in the perfect way, but we are here to fill the roles in many different ways so that we may reach many different people.  If we were all acting in the same manner the lesson would be lost to many, we need to have some variety and diversity in our approach so that we can help many people find understanding. Our differences help us to reach different people in different ways.  If we were all acting the same what would happen?

I challenge us all to look within ours own hearts to see who we are and who we want to be and then speak from our heart in our own manner.  Let's embrace our differences and share them with each other rather than trying to form ourselves into something we are not. 

Be who you are, that's all we have to do.  How simple is that?

You Are The Light

When faced with dark shadows of the past it is easy to get sucked in.  How do we keep ourselves from drowning in the darkness?  This is something I have struggled with for a long time.  I tend to slip right into the darkness and get stuck there. 

What if when faced with darkness we were to remember that in us lives the light, the shining, healing, loving, beautiful light of God.  If we were to remember this, perhaps looking at the darkness isn't so dangerous, perhaps we can see the darkness, but know that our light still shines within, no matter what we've done or who we've been.  The light of God lives within in us and nothing we say or do or think can distinguish it....how amazing is that?  How reassuring is that?  How comforting and freeing!

If we can hold on to the understanding that God' love light shines within us and never leaves us then we can see the dark times and understand that they do not control us or shape us or own us, they are simply experiences we've had that we can let go.  Perhaps we can even use our own love light energy to transform them.

What if we were to look at our dark memories and hold them just as they are, as a deep learning experience and then we were to send nothing but love and light into those memories.  What would this do to them?  What effect would this have on them?  Would this transform them into to something new?  Would this allow us to release ourselves from the pain, guilt and suffering we've had attached to these experiences?  Can we ourselves transform the darkness using the light that lives with in us?  Can we ourselves be the light of the world?  I say we can,  I know we can.  Look within to your own light and shine that light to the world around you.   Be a transformer of the darkness. Forgive the past, send love into the world, into your life, into your future.  It's not hard, we ALL can do it!  Love and light to all of you and to the whole world. 

Emotional Ambush

Looking into the shadows of our past seems to be part of claiming our mess and healing ourselves.  This is not something that is easy and for me, it has always seemed much easier to take a quick peek and then stuff as much of the painful past in a closet as I could.  The problem with that is it's still there, underneath the surface waiting to pop back out and effect our daily life in ways we aren't even aware of.  It would be better if we were to allow ourselves to examine our past, see what we might have changed if we could, take responsibility for our own actions and then release ourselves and others from any judgment or guilt instead of just stuffing it all away.  If this were easy and I was good at it, I probably wouldn't be writing this blog!

Many times I have thought I had healed and released issues from my past only to find myself suddenly faced with raging emotions triggered by some small incident that brought up memories of the past.  It's shocking when it happens and sometimes frightening, especially if we think we no longer have strong feelings connected to the past. Sometimes when this happens we may be unaware of what is going on, it's as if suddenly we are having this huge emotional outburst for no logical reason.  We may  be able to see that we are being irrationally upset over something that shouldn't bother us so much, but have no clue why.

If we have an understanding of the idea that we should control our emotions, they shouldn't control us, then when our emotions go out of control it should signal to us that something is off somewhere. We should hopefully be able to allow ourselves to feel our emotions, but then step aside and look deeply at where they are coming from and what has triggered them.  If we can do this, we will see that many times we are not reacting to the situation at hand, but to something from our past life experiences.

Let's look at a generic example of this.  Let's say a friend, who we normally talk to  every day, suddenly doesn't call us for awhile and  when they do, they tell us all about how they were busy hanging out with someone else.  Suddenly we find our self angry, hurt and insecure, we feel like our friend is going to leave us and find someone better to replace us.  Our emotions go all haywire and we are sure we are going to be abandoned. We've become all paranoid and insecure and we aren't even really sure why.  Once we are able to put our emotions aside, we look deeply and realize that at some point in our life our best friend or our mate or whoever we felt extremely close to, left us for someone else.  We are reacting mostly to what happened in our past and assuming this is what will happen to our in your present.  I'm not sure if that's a very good example, but it's the most generic one I could think of at the moment.

The point is that something happened that triggered all of the feelings associated with that past life event and suddenly we are acting from that emotional memory instead of from the actual moment we are in right now. This is what happens when we haven't properly processed the difficult events in our lives.

I am by no means an expert at processing difficult events, but I have learned that it is very important to allow ourselves to experience the emotions of the event, without allowing ourselves to be stuck in them.  We need to find a safe way to express what we are feeling whether it is through speaking with friends, a counselor or trusted pastor.  Another method is to journal or write poetry or music or maybe paint or draw it out.  Anything that helps us to look into what we are feeling and release it in some manner.

It is helpful to allow ourselves a set time period to allow these emotions to come out.  This puts us in control of the situation.  When my dad was extremely ill I allowed myself 15-20 minutes each day of what I called my wallow time,  I would sit in the tub or shower with the water running and allow myself to think every deep, dark thought  that was bothering me about the whole situation.  I would cry and some times rant to release it all. After my time was up I had to do something productive or something that gave me joy, I didn't allow myself to dwell on everything I'd thought of.

Our bodies need us to allow ourselves to feel and release the emotions that arise, otherwise we become ill.  This doesn't mean we give ourselves permission to go on rampages ranting at everyone and being destructive. It means we learn ways to safely allow ourselves to feel our feelings, express them and release them.  If we don't do this we might find them sneaking out on us when we least expect it.

It would seem to avoid these emotional ambushes, it is best to deal with emotions right away when they pop up, look deeply to see what the actual cause of our emotional reaction is, face the issues we need to face, take responsibility for our own actions and then let them go.