“Today, give a stranger one of your smiles.  It might be the only sunshine he sees all day.”   ~Quoted in P.S. I Love You, compiled by H. Jackson Brown, Jr.

To update my readers – Nava’s surgery went well; she had it done laparoscopically and went home the same day.  She’s doing well, walking around to get rid of the gas and in a good mood.  She’s raring to go back to her life at the group home. 

My homework assignment to myself is to write a letter to the hospital commending them on absolutely wonderful service all around. 

Here’s to St. Francis (in Port Washington, NY), a hospital which truly practices compassionate service to those in a most vulnerable state.

From the security guard in the parking lot, to the volunteer at the information desk, to each and  every nurse and aide we came in contact with, to the woman at the cashier in the café, to the aide who wheeled Navi out to the parking lot,  there were only smiles, friendliness, helpfulness, and sheer pleasantness. 

Actually all this ‘niceness’ started last week when we went for her pre-op tests and exam. 

Not an ounce of grumpiness, curtness or anything even resembling a negative attitude was displayed by anyone.  Where do you find that nowadays?  I know – at Trader Joe’s. I already wrote Dan Bane, CEO,  a letter of compliments.   

I must assume that part of the job description in these two places is: ‘smiles and a compassionate interest in helping others.  Anyone with an attitude will be let go immediately.’

There is never room for any ‘attitude’, nastiness, curtness, sharpness in tone or negativity in a place of service, or for that matter any place that caters to people.

The hospital was also efficient, organized, calm and attractive, which naturally adds to a most positive experience.  But I’m focusing here on the people aspect because in the end they set the tone.…

Time to gear up those mental and psychological  muscles.  My daughter, Nava, is going in for surgery tomorrow.  Something else is coming out – 9 years ago it was the colon, now it’s the gallbladder.  A very common surgery as we all know.  But surgery is surgery and going under both the knife and anesthesia is a bit nerve-wracking.  They’re hoping to do it laparoscopically  but don’t know what sort of scarring they’ll find inside from her last surgeries. 

Nava’s been expressing her anxiety about this surgery and my response has been what I ‘preach’ against -“don’t worry, you’ve been through so much worse, this is no big deal.”  Wrong, wrong and wrong.  This is not what to say.  Of course it’s scary and a big deal to the one going through it.  Where’s my acknowledgement of her normal feelings of concern?  At lease I’ll have another chance when she comes home tonight for her favorite requested dinner of chicken cacciatore.

I’ve been having my own silent worries during sleep time, waking up the last few nights with that jittery feeling in my gut.  Otherwise I’ve been playing it down for myself.  After all I do know the life-threatening crisis she went through and this is no big deal, as long as it all goes well. 

And that’s the key – not to let myself go to the worry of where it doesn’t go well, and start to conjure up the ‘bad what-if’ scenerios.  I work hard at stopping myself from going there.  It’s a waste of energy needed for what’s real at the moment and more important to me is it puts me in a ‘bad’ place mentally. Thinking negatively saps my strength.   

How to stay in a relatively ‘good’ place before an anxiety-provoking event:

• Once a decision is made, it goes into the hands of a higher power; for me that’s G-d. 
• Let go of what you have no control over.

…

I am pleased to share my guest post on Lori Deschene’s inspirational blog, Tiny Buddha.

“In the long run, we shape our lives and we shape ourselves.  The process never ends until we die.  And the choices we make are ultimately our own responsibility.”  Eleanor Roosevelt   

‘They’ say things happen at the ‘right’ time.  For me hearing a presentation, live, by Jack Canfield, came at the perfect time.

I was in San Diego, the traveling babysitter for my precious 5-month old granddaughter, while my daughter attended a nutrition conference.  It was an all around win-win situation – a new place to sightsee and of course spend quality (alone) time with baby Rachel and daughter Penina.

When I found out Jack Canfield was the final key speaker, I jumped at the chance to attend.  And the topic certainly resonated with me – “getting from where you are to where you want to be.”  Now how’s that for someone in transition working to carve out a new path!

Click here to continue reading the article.

Thank you for stopping by.  Hope there’s some take-away here for you.…

As we see with Temple Grandin’s success, one of the most important things we can do is help people feel good about themselves. 

We  don’t have to be the doctor or lawyer or rich business person. 

But we do need to feel competent and good about who we are as a person. 

Happiness comes from how we feel inside about ourselves. 

It’s not what we do as a profession; it’s who we are as a human being. 

This attitude and way of thinking has taken shape and evolved through raising my daughter with special needs. 

When Nava was a baby and we lived in the Chicago area, we used to visit a farm community for adults with disabilities during their weekend crafts fair.  I loved the land and the environment but I used to leave feeling sad;  sad that Joe was just making popcorn and Mary was just bagging at the cashier.  That’s what they did in life?  How can they be happy with just that?  I can still feel the pit in my stomach as I drove home from the farm.    

I realized I was looking at these people’s jobs and happiness through my own lens.  No, I would not be too thrilled {just} making popcorn all day or packaging people’s purchases. 

But that’s the content, the product.  Perhaps the process, the inner workings of the person, was relaying a completely different message – one of joy and gratitude, of appreciation and feelings of competence and pride. 

The ‘farm people’ certainly radiated joy and showed such pride in what they did. 

And so my focus  became helping Navi  feel good about whatever it was she was doing and  attempting, however small a feat it was. I didn’t know what she would be capable of doing when she grew up.  But I wanted her to be armed with as much positive feelings and high self- esteem as possible.   

It was about instilling in her feelings of self pride, competence, success  and overall good feelings about herself.    …

In my interview with Temple Grandin, she brought up a few key points that really seemed to resonate with people.  ‘Building strengths’ was a biggie.

I worked in the school system for years.  I won’t go into a tirade of how this concept of building upon the student’s strengths is not done; rather quite the opposite – everyone is made to fit into the box of test score production, or else…. failure, misfit, special ed labels set in.  So I will leave it at this.

And yes, in all fairness there are individual teachers who most definitely do hone in on a child’s area of strength and look to build on it.  They bring in books on the specific area of interest, create projects around it and try to teach skills by utilizing their strength as a springboard.

In my workshops with parents (parents classes) I stress that not every child is good at everything, just like we’re not ‘abled’ in every area.   We need to see what each child is good at, what his/her interests are and hone in on that, bring that out, help each bud sprout in his/her unique way.  Not everyone is academically oriented and that needs to be O.K.  (I know this is a tough one since our world is so academically pressured and competition in this area is ridiculously and dangerously high.)   We have to value strength in whatever area it manifests and then build around that.

I once had a parent talk about her child’s interest in snakes.  Although she was disgusted by them, she went out and bought her 10 year old son a pet snake.  The other parents jumped in with, ‘oh, how could you, I can’t even look at them.’  Her wonderful response was, ‘I want to encourage his interest.  It doesn’t have to be mine; maybe he’ll grow up and be a scientist or zoologist.’  Now that’s an enlightened parent. …

Tracey Jackson wrote in her comment to the Temple Grandin interview, “The lesson is in the fact you asked her.  .. To quote one of my favorite quotes, ‘If you don’t ask, the answer will always be no.’”

To further this idea, if you ask and get turned down, you’re no worse off than before you asked. 

I developed this ‘habit’ at my job as a school social worker.  It’s called asking for what you want.  I don’t take full credit for it.  This idea really grabbed me when I read in the book, “Kabul Beauty School”(for my parent book clubs which I facilitated) that the author, Deborah Rodriguez,  asked the Paul Mitchell hair product company  if they  would donate hair products for a beauty school teaching program she was trying to start in Afganistan, in an attempt to empower and train women.  Sure enough she was sent box loads of hair products. 

I was so taken with this seemingly simple thing Ms. Rodriquez did, that I decided to try it with some of my school projects.   I wanted to take my (immigrant) parent groups to experience a Broadway show in the city; and so I contacted theatre companies explaining my purpose and asking for tickets.  Guess what, we got 20 tickets for Mary Poppins and Hairspray. 

When my colleague and I were doing a presentation (on facilitating book clubs) at the Marriott and wanted to do an ‘Oprah book give-a-way’, I contacted publishing companies explaining and asking for books for our participants.  Guess what, I got 50 copies of a wonderful book that was waiting for them at their seat when they came in.

I’m not saying this to brag but rather to show how important a skill this is in trying to create the life we want. 

Hearing, seeing, speaking to inspirational people who have created good lives despite their difficulties is a deep interest and passion of mine. …