Tag: inspiration

Common Denominator

Months ago, I tripped on the sidewalk and my cell phone went flying through the air, and landed hard, real hard, on the pavement. When I picked it up, I was relieved to see that the screen was fine. I have a good case on my phone. Sadly though, when I turned the phone around, I noticed that the back of it had the “crackle” look. The back of the phone had been shattered.

Still, I was delighted to notice that my phone still worked, despite its new shattered look, and I figured that as long as it stayed in the case, my cell phone would be fine. No harm, no foul. Now, the truth is, we carry insurance on our cell phones, and for a nominal fee, I could have my cell phone replaced. But, honestly, I dreaded the experience of having a new phone sent out, having to figure out how to transfer everything, and I lived in fear of losing everything on my phone, despite backing it up regularly. So, I deluded myself that I was just taking a long time to consider whether I should just upgrade to a newer version of my phone or to get the insurance replacement, and then, I essentially just put it out of my mind.

Lately however, when I have been talking on the phone, I noticed that people were going in and out, and I was missing every 10th word or so. Usually, I blamed this on the other party. “You’re in a bad spot. You’re mumbling. Your bluetooth isn’t working,” I would grumble to others when I was talking to them. Sometimes, I would blame myself . . . .for being in a dead spot or having clogged ears. Finally (this took a long while, as I’m a stubborn old coot), I came to terms that I was the common denominator in this situation. It was my phone that was not working correctly. So, even with that realization, I still waited for several weeks more, telling myself that the old “turn off/on” trick would probably work. It didn’t. Many times that trick did not work.

So yesterday, I finally filed an easy, quick claim, and my insurance company sent someone out, on the very same day to bring me a new phone and to set it up, free of charge. Voila! It was that simple. And I still have all of my data, pictures, contacts, texts, etc. on my new phone.

This made me reflect on a good little lesson about life. If we have an ongoing problem in our lives with other people, institutions, etc., it is often helpful to open ourselves up to some real truthful self-awareness. If we feel that we are the poor victims in every single situation in our lives, guess what? That all gets whittled down to one common denominator – us, the poor, lowly victims. Can you imagine?!? In every single situation in our lives, we innocents feel totally wronged and victimized. In my cell phone situation, it was my belief that everyone else’s phone wasn’t working correctly, until I faced that I was the common denominator in this situation. It was my phone that wasn’t working. When I finally accepted that this situation was actually my problem, I had the insight and the power and the ability and the mojo, to finally do something about it.

Look for patterns of the gripes and problems in your own life. There are areas in our lives where we all have valid gripes. There are areas in our lives where our hands our totally tied. But they aren’t as many as we think. If you find yourself, having the same gripes and the same problems with many different sources, be honest with yourself – you are the common denominator. And once you do this, you have empowered yourself. You are no longer a victim. You can work on changes needed, in order to change the detrimental situations that you find yourself in regularly.

This is not a lesson is shame. Shame is what keeps us from telling the truth to ourselves. Shame is painful. To get beyond pain, we need to be compassionate with ourselves, as we open up to the truth about things. When we forgive ourselves for the parts which we play in our own problems, we then move on to the healthy path of direction, improvement and empowerment. We all make mistakes. We all get caught up in negative patterns. (some of these patterns have started as early as childhood) But we all, also, have the gift of reason and insight, to help us to get on to better paths.

Get detached from your ego, and look at patterns in your own life that you wish to change. Get real with yourself about the part that you play in these patterns, and try something new. This is how positive change happens in our lives. This exercise is what opens our lives to new possibilities and ways of feeling. And empowerment feels a hell of a lot better than embitterment and hopelessness.

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Here is the question of the day from 3000 Questions About Me:

2004. What makes you stand out in a crowd?

80th

I’m sorry for the late post today. I got caught up reading all about the approximately 68 American heroes, World War II veterans, who travelled to Normandy, France this week ahead of the 80th anniversary of D-Day on June 6th. Their ages range from 96-107. Over 141,000 Americans gave up their lives to free Europe during World War II. When these heroic individuals have been interviewed by the media this week, they are mostly more concerned to pay homage to their friends and fellow soldiers who died in battle. They aren’t called “The Greatest Generation” for no reason. I sure hope that there is such thing as reincarnation. We need more of their kind back.

“Americans have a profound longing for heroes – now perhaps more than ever.” – Hampton Sides

“there on the beaches of Normandy I began to reflect on the wonders of these ordinary people whose lives were laced with the markings of greatness.” – Tom Brokaw

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Here is the question of the day from 3000 Questions About Me:

2252. Who is the one person you’d love to have as a mentor?

Too Much

Nothing is more lush than the beginning of summer. The start of summer is full of sun, and colors in their most full and vibrant varieties, and long, lingering, “hesitant to go to sleep” daytimes. No one rushes in summer. There is a feeling in the air, that there is time enough to get everything done, even if “everything” includes a whole lot of nothing. No one makes any excuses in summer. You don’t have to make excuses when languid is the expected pace of anyone and anything. Summer is the excuse. I read an article today that suggested that depending on the person or the situation, the beginning of summer is either a time of hope, or a time of dread. I reflected on this idea. When I was a child, the beginning of summer was bursting with hope and excitement. School was off, pools were open, trips were planned, new adventures were as ready as one’s imagination, on a daily basis. When I was a mother of young children, I felt pretty much the same way. It was a relief to get off the hamster wheel of the school and sports schedules that pulled us in exponential directions. It was okay to sleep in, because the daylight would last seemingly forever. Now I am an empty nester. And I live in Florida. Florida is notorious for hot and humid summers. And we are only at the starting gate of “Hot and Humid.” I don’t dread summer. I enjoy the buttoned down casualness that seems to overtake even the most “buttoned up” of any of us (myself included). But any beginning “hope” of the summer season, quickly turns to “I really, really hope summer’s over soon” as the sun turns itself to the Broil setting, and the hopeful blooms of lush quickly turn into dry, shriveled patches of parched surrender, and hurricane season swoops in with its dramatic, unpredictable flourish. I get it now. The beginning of summer can be a time of hope and yet also, a time of dread. And Summer, with her optimistic, light-filled, bright disposition, boldly bouncing in, donning her hard-to-miss ANYTHING GOES colorful t-shirt, laughs at the idea that anyone could dread her coming into town. “Is there really such thing as too much of a good thing?” she boldly asks, as she heralds in the only season which we collectively dare to answer that question.

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Here is the question of the day from 3000 Questions About Me:

1682. What do you consider unforgivable?

DO NOT Help Me Write

****I’ll start by saying that recently, a “Help Me Write” by Google feature, has popped up when I am writing my blog, whenever I take a moment to think, or if I go back to parts of my post to make changes. I find this incredibly annoying. I will NEVER utilize this feature. (thus the typos, the awkward sentences, and my own, creative-licensed grammar rules) I am saddened by the idea of anyone’s individual “voice” to be taken out of our own unique writing. Our writing should be an extension of us, as individual as our fingerprints and our handwriting. We are all authentic, unrepeatable individuals. Even identical twins are not copies of each other because it is impossible to have the very same identical experiences, every moment of the day. Just as our DNA, our genes, our proclivities and our heritage make up the whole of us, so do our experiences, and our reactions to our experiences, and all of this is uniquely unrepeatable and precious. When I write, it comes from my own uniquely unrepeatable heart’s energy, not from an inhuman algorithm.****

Speaking of incredibly unique and authentic individuals, recently I purchased something on eBay, and I got into a conversation about the item with the seller. The seller turned out to be the daughter of two extremely intriguing, interesting, colorful characters (now deceased) who were a married couple and utterly devoted to each other, and also to their individual, exotic pursuits. The husband, Mentor Huebner was a prolific artist who worked for movie studios in Hollywood and created conceptual designs for 250 movie sets including the movies like Blade Runner, Ben Hur, King Kong, Lord of the Rings, etc. According to his wife, Mentor enjoyed painting so much that she would often have to beg him to stop painting, just to eat. Because Mentor was employed by movie studios, he didn’t have to rely on collectors buying his paintings for his living, and he was known to turn down exorbitant offers if he didn’t like the buyer, and other times he gave away his paintings (worth $1000s of dollars) to people whom he did like. The wife, Louise Huebner, was pronounced “The Official Witch of Los Angeles County” at the Hollywood Bowl in 1968. She considered herself to be a generational witch and she wrote many books and appeared on many radio programs and talk shows such as The Johnny Carson Show, discussing occult matters. When the daughter mentioned her parents in our message exchange, I went down a rabbit hole (as it is so easy to do on the internet) to learn more about these fascinating people.

Mentor Huebner died in 2001. In 2003, Louise Huebner created a website devoted to his life and his art. Louise died in 2014, but the Mentor Huebner website remains. Underneath a running clock, are these words:

Revelations of Mentor’s Life and Art

Public and Personal

Will Continue to Appear On This Ever to Be Expanding Site

Forever!

Or at the Very Least as is True of the Universe

Until the End of Time.

I find exotic, unapologetically authentic, audacious, passionate people so interesting and inspiring. They live their lives so bravely and honestly and unapologetically. They live lives as they feel inclined and guided to do, and they are not at all concerned with what other people’s opinions about how they should conduct themselves. They are inimitable. I don’t imagine that they go to their graves with regrets.

Clearly the Huebers shared a passionate love and mutual admiration for one another. Louise wrote loads of poetry and almost all of her poems were devoted to Mentor. A poem that she wrote ten days before Mentor passed, compares herself to a Pharaoh’s wife terrified to be put in the tomb alive with the Pharaoh’s body. In her poem, “Until Death Do Us Part” Louise Huebner writes, “I however enter my grave of grief most willingly.” She compares herself to the Egyptian wife: “But there is a thing she and I seem to have in common ~ we ignore everything we have been taught and so often are inappropriate.” She ends the poem with this verse filled with her passionate devotion to her husband, again comparing herself to the ancient Egyptian Pharoah’s wife: “Yet she spent the rest of her life screaming to get out of her husband’s grave, and it looks as though I will spend the rest of mine, screaming to get in.”

Everyone has a story. You do, too. It’s more interesting than you could possibly realize. Start telling your story. Better yet, start living it. Be true to your innermost longings, inclinations and intuitions. You deserve to experience the truest, fullest version of you. We all do. Imagine a world of inimitable, uninhibited, passionate, talented, unapologetic people, living lives true to themselves. What an amazing, exhilarating world it would be (and not one of us would be utilizing Help Me Write/Live/Think/Love)!

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Here is the question of the day from 3000 Questions About Me:

467. Do you have a scar? If so, how did you get it?

ODAT

One day at a time . . . . I love ODAT. It’s really the only way to go with anything: problems, goals, trips, projects, habits, healing, seasons. “Just for today, I will . . . . .” If you simplify anything down to ODAT, it’s doable. It’s manageable. It’s possible. It’s achievable. ODATs all add up, too. Ask anyone who has started a business, lost weight, kicked addictions, worked through grief, wrote a book, built a house, healed from a disease or an ailment . . . . Today, when you find yourself in a tiz over anything, apply ODAT. Figure out what steps or actions you need to do for this goal or situation, just for today. Let the ODATs take you to where you want to go. ODATS help you to grow. You learn patience, practicality, trust, faith, steadiness, and the ability to create good habits. You learn that your days all add up to your entire lifetime. You learn that you are able to do more in a day than you ever expected. You get planful instead of panic-full. ODAT. Make it part of your vernacular. Make it part of your breathwork. Make it your way of life.

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Here is the question of the day from 3000 Questions About Me:

956. What is the craziest craving you ever had?

Intentional Summer

We’ve unofficially entered through the glorious gateway to another summer of our lives. I know that summer technically starts later in June, but from a calendar/nostalgia sense, we walked through the gates, into another delicious summer this past weekend. Summer is a time of experience, isn’t it? We often plan trips and reunions and outings and adventures in summer. We do yard projects and picnics and beach days.

I read something this morning written by Esther Hicks that suggested that before you give something your attention, make sure that you actually want to experience that person, place or thing which is the focus of your attention. You don’t have to give your attention to everything that is going on, all around you. In fact, you couldn’t give your attention to everything that exists, even if you tried. You can read or watch the news, but you don’t have to do it. You can get as involved or not involved with someone else’s drama, as much as you choose to do so. You don’t have to attend everything you have been invited to attend. You can ruminate on situations that happened in the past, or you can worry about situations that might happen in the future, but none of this is necessary. Remember, whatever you give your attention to, becomes part of your overall experience. There is so much out there in the world that we can spend our attention on (available at the click of a button), that we might as well become really, really choosy about where we spend our attention. Why not spend our attention on things that we truly enjoy and value experiencing? Why not spend our attention on things that truly enhance our own experience of living a life? Why not take these initial steps out of the gateway, into summer, with the idea that this will be The Most Present and Intentional Summer of Our Lives?

Vow to only spend your attention on things that you actually want to be part of your overall life’s experience. Be choosy. There are summer berries galore in the garden. Strawberries will still exist for others, if you choose to only eat blueberries. Strawberries will most likely be available to you, if you later choose to focus on eating them. Choose carefully. Choose wisely. Your attention is the most precious gift that you give to anyone or anything, including yourself. Give this gift mindfully this summer, and you will most likely experience the most gratifying and resonating summer of your life.

“And so with the sunshine and the great bursts of leaves growing on the trees, just as things grow in fast movies, I had that familiar conviction that life was beginning over again with the summer. There is an almost religious ‘rebirth’ that comes with the end of winter.” – from The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Here is the question of the day from 3000 Questions About Me:

659. What are you really intense about?

Memorial Monday

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you to any of you reading this who have lost loved ones and comrades in service to our country and to our value of freedom. We are indebted to you. May your great loss never be in vain.

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Here is the question of the day from 3000 Questions About Me:

1256. Do you believe in fate – or that a person shapes her own destiny?

The Question

I was reminded recently of an excellent, clarifying question to ask yourself about a situation that you feel muddled and conflicted about. It is a question that will help you to get really clear on your own deepest desires. This is not to say that this should be the only criteria when making major decisions, but it gives you a starting point as to pointing you to what you really want, and helps you to go from there. Here is the question:

“What would you do if it was only possible for you to take your own happiness into account?”

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Here is the question of the day from 3000 Questions About Me:

1910. What is the most expensive thing you have ever lost?

Quit Time

I just read an article about “emotional quitting.” This is usually the major predecessor to any kind of official quitting, whether it be a job, or a relationship, or a hobby, a project, a life direction, a religion, etc. “Emotional quitting” looks like just “going through the motions”, but not really investing any energy, or plans towards something going forward. Emotional quitting means you have lost interest and desire for something or for someone who used to excite you and used to help you to grow and blossom. Sometimes when you emotionally quit an experience, you just can’t find the fire to ignite your passion again, even if you are desperately trying to do so. You feel detached and indifferent.

Emotionally quitting is usually a long, slow process. It doesn’t happen overnight. It’s just little chips which are chiseled away without anything else put in place to replenish the energy stream towards it. Emotionally quitting something is rarely a rash, overnight, dramatic decision. It happens so slowly that we often don’t realize that we have been in the process of quitting, until we are already there. Most experiences that we “officially” quit have long, long been quit emotionally by us, before we have the courage to make it “official.” Emotional quitting is often a quiet process, versus a loud, dramatic bang.

Today’s world puts a big emphasis on the need to be conscious and self-aware, in order to stay mentally and emotionally healthy in a quickly-changing world. This is vitally important in a time where life is changing so rapidly with technology innovations, and a myriad of opportunities that our ancestors simply did not have, to contemplate and to experience. There has never been a more important time in history, to emphasize the need to take a pause, and to reflect on where we are going, and where we want to end up. So, in this light, take the time to contemplate any “emotional quitting” that is occuring in your own life. What has grown stale in your life? Which of these areas are worth revitalizing, and how would you take steps to do this? Has it come time to face that it might be time to “officially” quit something that you have emotionally abandoned a long time ago? What are your beliefs about “quitting” and are these beliefs helpful or hindering to you? What are your true values and priorities, and are you actually living them? What is holding you back? What are your fears and reservations? How long has your “emotional quitting” been happening? What is capturing your energy and vitality instead? Where are you feeling indifferent? If you feel listless and indifferent, all the way around, could this point to a physical/mental condition that should be addressed?

This is a tough read, I know. We don’t want to face change in our lives, even though we all know that “change is the only constant.” We often emotionally quit things to make it easier to finally cut the final tie, and “officially” quit. Our emotions are our built in navigation system. Strong emotions point us to what is important to us. The opposite of love is not hate. The opposite of love is “indifference.” Get real with yourself about which parts of your life you are emotionally withdrawing from, and decide what you want to do about it. You deserve an intentionally full and vital life.

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Here is the question of the day from 3000 Questions About Me:

1457. Are you more worried about doing things right, or doing the right things?

The Emotional Body

In my morning readings today, two ideas really stuck out for me. The first idea is about “embracing the contradictions.” It is quite possible to feel opposite feelings about the same experience, all at the same time. This is particularly true during the major transition times in our lives which mark endings and new beginnings, such as graduations, weddings, births, moving houses, divorces, funerals, retirements, etc. We often stamp, “This is how I’m supposed to feel,” onto certain situations and then we sometimes feel shame if we feel some “relief” when we think we should only be “sad”, or we feel shame if we feel “fear”, when we think we should be “happy.” Contradictory feelings are messy. They bring about things like “happy tears” or “pride and melancholy.” Contradictory feelings are hard to sort, because perhaps, they are not really supposed to be sorted and ordered. We have a lot of volume available in our emotional bodies. We can feel all sorts of feelings all at once, and in no particular order. When we accept the normalcy of messy, contradictory feelings, we can remain the calm center of the storm. And we can let our experiences wash over us in every color and sensation which they are supposed to happen to us. We can experience what happens in our lives both fully and open-heartedly, knowing that we will be better and more evolved for doing so.

Similar to this thought, I read about the difference between the emotion generated by delusions versus emotions created by true perceptions. How many times have you gotten yourself into a angsty tangle because you believed a story that you created in your head about a person, or a situation, or an experience, which you later found out to be untrue? We do this all of the time. We have very good imaginations. “Our neighbor doesn’t like us.” “The house down the street is haunted.” “Someone stole my scissors.” And if we aren’t feeling all that imaginative, there are all sorts of “news sources” which can help us out, to spur on delusional thinking. And then we feel the same horrible emotions we would feel, as if the situations were actually true. Emotions require a great deal of energy. Emotions also have a tendency to spur on our minds to create more fearsome, troublesome stories, in order to support their ongoing turbulence. Emotions love to run hot and strong. Emotions love to be felt. Emotions love it when they even start to affect our physical bodies, with stomach aches and headaches, and other other aches and pains and chills. Bottom line, there is nothing wrong with feeling emotion. Just make sure that you are honest with yourself, by noticing if you are expending your emotional energy on the truth versus on falsehoods. Be as mindful where you put your thoughts and your emotions, as to where you put your other resources, such as your money and your time. Pay attention. Be in the moment. All of these things are what makes up the experience of daily life, which ultimately is the whole of your life.

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Here is the question of the day from 3000 Questions About Me:

1429. What is standing between you and one of your biggest dreams?