I love Paul Williams’ line, “When I got honest and egoless, I found the help I needed.”  This can be tough for a lot of us.  Getting real with oneself is no easy feat.  We all live with a curtain of denial around us.  It serves as a protector so we can function through most things in our lives.  But when our life and functioning ability is being diminished, it’s high time we open that curtain and expose our difficulty to the light. For it is when we shed light upon it that we can begin the work of chipping away at it.

We have to put aside bravado and bring forth vulnerability.  We have to acknowledge to ourselves that we are {all} flawed and that there’s no shame in that.

We have to “give ourselves permission to be human” with all that that entails.  Feeling those icky feelings – of shame, fear, powerlessness- they’re all part of being human.  If we look them in the face, meet them head-on, and dance with them awhile, they will go through us and start to lose some of their grip.  We will then be more open to facing our issues.

It’s said that courage is not the lack of fear; it’s feeling the fear and doing it anyway.

Sometimes we’re afraid of what we might find when we open up our pandoras box.  We may not like the outcome of examining the problem.  I once spoke to a friend trying to encourage him to get professional help.  His response to me,“ If I delve into my marriage too much, I may discover I really want to get divorced and I can’t do that, so I’m not going there.”  It takes courage to examine a problem.  There’s fear of the unknown; where will it take me?

It takes strength of character to be ready and willing to deal with the issue, to walk on an unpaved path.…

I stood there as he was led away, tears welling up in my eyes and slowly dropping down my cheeks.  He actually turned his head and looked back like a child looking for that last wave good-bye.

Our nineteen months of raising Yael, our foster puppy, had come to an end.  We returned him to CCI, Canine Companions for Independence, to begin his testing to see if he’d qualify for being a service/companion dog for a person with disabilities.

Our job was complete, the end result being unknown.  It would be about six months until we’d find out if he ‘passed’.

What began as looking into a companion dog for my daughter with disabilities ended up with serving the cause – raising the dog for another.

This greater cause grounded me and kept me focused on the task at hand: to do the best possible job at raising a gentle, well-mannered and well-trained dog capable of carrying out his mission in life.  My  husband and I worked at following his instruction manual pretty much to a tee.   It was hard, meaningful and joyful – an overall rich experience.

We naturally fell in love with his adorable nature and looks; his sleek yellow body that always looked for  cuddles, hugs and playful belly-rubbing.  The common question (and statement) we encountered was, “how are you going to give him back?  I could never do it.”  Although I didn’t know it at the time, this was to be a lesson in letting go; connecting and letting go.  We knew from the get-go he wasn’t ours.  We were ‘in service’.   We literally let go of his leash with sadness.

Months later when we got his acceptance letter in the mail, we were ‘faklempted’; we were filled with emotion.   And for the second time we let go of his leash, this time for good at graduation, as we walked him up onstage and handed over his leash to his new ‘owner’ – a boy with cerebral palsy. …

We all have such hectic days trying to squeeze everything in, and then some.  The common mantra is, “I don’t have enough time” or “I certainly don’t have any time for me.”

But we’re doing a tremendous disservice to ourselves by simply getting up in the morning and jumping on that turning wheel trying to chase around and play catch up the whole day, only to then go to sleep and start all over again.

We may not have a whole hour or block of time to devote to doing something pleasurable for ourselves.  But we can surely find a few minutes here and there to incorporate some joyful moments.  We can’t wait for those long time periods of free time.  For our own well-being and feelings of positivity, those brief interludes go a long way to replenish ourselves and add that bit of necessary enjoyment to fill our daily buckets.

So…

• Wake up a little earlier than you have to and do something you enjoy- be it exercise, wrapping your hands around that mug of hot coffee and enjoying the silence, reading, meditating, listening to music.
• Pencil in a few minute break for youself during the day.  Pretend it’s a meeting or appointment.  Respect it and keep it as you would with anyone else.
• Be mindful of the nice things around you.  When we notice the good and the beauty around us and bring it into ourselves, it feels good.
• Fix up a small area in your house with meaningful things.  Look around at it and revel in your little haven.
• At bedtime, write down 3 things you’re grateful for.  This will start to shift your focus to some of the positive things.
• Value yourself and know that you can be more giving, more nurturing and more productive when you feel good.
• Remember, a little bit goes a long way.  So start reading a couple of pages of that book that’s been sitting there for weeks. 

…

I’m excited to share with you my  guest post  over at Gratitude and Trust, a new blog by the wonderful Tracey Jackson and Paul Williams.  Ms. Jackson is a writer and screenwriter and Mr. Williams is a singer and songwriter.    Some of you ‘older’ folks may remember him from back in the ‘70’s.  He’s written many hit movie songs.   Currently he is very passionately involved in recovery work.

Click here below to read my post and enjoy a new site with uplifting quotes, stories and posts.

http://www.gratitudeandtrust.com/keep-your-eye-on-the-donut-and-not-upon-the-hole/

I will be away next week at Kripalu in the Berkshires for a 5 day ‘immersion’ as an exciting beginning to the 11 month positive psychology certificate course I’m enrolled in.  Therefore, no blog posts for the week.    Check out the course information here.  You might want to look into it for the next session in 2014.  It’s a transformative life course, both personally and professionally.

Have a great week and keep your eye on the donut.  There’s a lot of good stuff there.…

How do we experience gratitude?  Do we feel it?  Do we express it beyond a generic ‘thank you’.  Do we truly experience it and savor such times/events/people?

Gratitude can bring much richness to our lives.  It is an antidote to depression, negativity, the half-empty glass mind-set.  When we bring to mind what we’re grateful for, we experience positive feelings.  Writing them down can sink them into our being even more and elicits those good emotions.

All too often we take note of the negatives and openly express our criticisms; and the positives fall upon those taken-for-granted silences.  It seems like we have to work harder at focusing on what we’re grateful for and work our minds in that direction.   And so some exercises have been developed from the field of positive psychology to enhance and strengthen our appreciation muscle.  One such exercise is a  letter of gratitude, where we write the specifics of our appreciation to someone who has impacted our life in a positive way.  It’s a two-way win of highly charged positive endorphins here.  The writer re-experiences those warm and good feelings as she puts the thoughts and feelings on paper; and the recipient feels great significance knowing how she effected and impacted another person.

It is best to share the letter with the person, preferably in person or at least by mail or on the phone.

Perhaps you will write your letter of gratitude to someone.  Here is mine:

Dear B,

This is long overdue.  But as long as we’re still on this earth together it’s not too late for you to know how thankful I continue to feel for all that you did for Nava and us during our year of her medical crisis.  You are forever a role-model in how to be selflessly giving and initiating in good deeds (mitzvahs).  You appeared constantly throughout the year as if an angel from heaven had descended upon us.…

“ Biography does not equal destiny.” Tony Robbins

What a great line, a great concept.  When we believe our past shapes our future, we’re missing the boat of life.   Yes, it may explain things and provide understanding but ‘using’ the past as a reason why things can’t be better, or accepting the way things are because of …..as that finger points back in the blame game mode, only continues to keep us entrenched in our victim mode of apparatus.

If this were the case, that our biography creates our life, then why are there so many poor little rich people – people who’ve come out of homes with seemingly everything who end up in rehab – addicted, depressed, suicidal?

And why are there those who’ve had rough childhoods – be it poor, abusive, ill – and they rise above their difficult past and create empowering and successful lives?    Oprah, Dave Pelzer, Jim Carrey to name but a few.

There’s obviously something beyond our biography, beyond our conditions that bring us to a better place.   And that’s the decisions we make each step of the way.    Yes, there are also innate qualities of resilience that we have which certainly help us forge ahead and carry us above and beyond our misfortunes.  And we can certainly build and develop those resiliency characteristics.  But we must also take an active role in carving out the life we want to have and not resign ourselves to doom and gloom because of that big nail sticking out known as the Past.

We have to meet it, dance with it and then part ways and move on to some new steps.

How do we engage in those new steps?

1. Understand from whence you come.
2. Get to know what you like, what moves you, what interests you.
3. Dream and envision possibilities.
4. Give yourself permission to step forward.
5. Begin to take responsibility for your life.
6. Put that pointer finger towards yourself and take stock – what do I want, how do I want to live my life.

…