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The sun making a rare appearance helps me to remember to appreciate it.
I take so much for granted. The absence of something helps me remember to be grateful for it and recognize the value and meaning it has in my life. In this way we do gain from our losses…opportunities to have gratitude for what matters in our lives.
When I feel gratitude I also do connect with feelings of joy. It’s a powerful perspective to be grateful.
For me, even something as simple as seeing the sun is an opportunity for moments of gratitude. It is the simple things in life that bring us joy. It is the little day to day things that mean the most.
So I’ll let the sunshine it and face it with a grin and open up my heart and let the sunshine in!
What simple thing in your life are you grateful for today?
Ain’t what she used to be…ain’t what she used to be…the old gray mare….she ain’t what she used to be…many long years ago!
Boy do I feel that reality! My weekend warrior spring cleaning is taking a toll on this not so young body of mine! The hot pad and topical sore muscle relief cream have become my best friends.
I remember the days when I would vacuum and wash the floors of my house and then go in to work a full day for an afternoon and evening! That would do me in at this stage of the game…ah, youth how quickly you have faded!
I don’t seem to be able to get quite as much done as I once did.
I do need to pace myself, remember that things take me longer to do, and be realistic that I don’t have quite as much endurance and strength as I once did. This is not easy for me to do.
My mind is much younger in its expectations of the rest of my body!
Perhaps it would be helpful if my mind were to catch up with the rest of my body or perhaps not…best be careful what I wish for!
My mind wishes me forever young and I suppose that is what keeps me going and going in pursuit of the good old energizer bunny that I once was!
What do you notice about the changes in your energy level?
I’ve started my winter “spring cleaning” house projects. It’s the time of year I go through drawers and wipe them out, dust the backs of hanging pictures, move the bigger pieces of furniture and clean behind them. That deep kind of cleaning that freshens up the house. I get it done in winter so I can enjoy tending my yard when spring actually comes.
I’ve decided it is time to say goodbye to some of the things I’ve collected over the years that no longer are needed or used. I’m at that point in life that it’s time to let more things go.
It’s interesting how in our early adult lives we work so hard to collect possessions. And in our later adult lives we work hard to let them go.
Our perspective certainly does change during life.
I form attachment to things. They remind me of a time in my life or a person who perhaps gave the thing to me as a gift. This attachment can make it hard for me to let something go.
What once was important isn’t so much at this age and stage of my life. Earlier I was building a life and working hard to do so. I don’t have to build any more.
Attachment to things seems less important as my perspective shifts.
So my winter “spring cleaning” is creating some bigger give away piles and a few less “stuff’s” in closets and on shelves this year. I suspect this is just the beginning of what lies ahead in the next part of my life’s journey too!
What perspectives do you notice changing at this point in your life’s journey?
I so much am a creature of habit who likes things to stay the same. That is unless of course the change is something that I desire, then I go willingly right along with it and pretty easily accept change. But then I don’t want that change to change.
And heaven forbid that a change is unwanted say because it’s hard to deal with…I certainly don’t want THAT kind of change to happen!
And yet our growth or change starts in our mother’s wombs. We are constantly developing, evolving, changing.
I do struggle with the reality of impermanence. I like to cling to what is particularly when it suits me and often letting go is a struggle.
Let’s face it, on a very basic level, we all want pleasant experiences to linger, to hang around; we don’t really want unpleasant things to happen now do we!
So we resist, we fight it and in doing this we create a great deal of suffering for ourselves. My reaction to change makes all the difference. When we accept change, peace follows.
When I pause and recognize my thinking and my struggle–the resistance, the tantrums, the dug in tootsies, it helps me to smile with myself and relax a bit, let go and accept change. Till the next time that is when change hits me between the eyes and I’m knocked off balance once again.
Awareness means I’m a step removed from the thought itself and notice or observe it rather than being consumed or one with it.
It’s not something that comes naturally for me to do either. It’s far more enticing to be all caught up in my thinking than to step back and notice it with some curiosity. My day however tends to go better when I practice noticing my thoughts rather than live in them. I react with more balance to the world around me.
I’m fairly certain the people I encounter appreciate it when I am more in balance with life too!
What happens for you when you take notice of what your thoughts are doing?
Contact Me together in therapy we can explore life coping tools for you to incorporate into your life’s journey!
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I say do change because it’s a process that takes a huge commitment to really makes changes happen. It’s easy to say I’m going to change X, Y or Z. It’s the doing for the long haul that is not an easy task.
Many of us fall off the change horse ride after a short time and don’t get back on again until this same time next year for another go at it.
Perhaps a more useful intention would be to commit to restarting again once we lose the forward momentum that gets us started on the process of change. The loss of momentum is after all is part of the process of change itself. It just is. And it’s important not to judge ourselves for being human too when we take a break from what we’ve started.
Once we notice we’ve ventured off the change path we can gently remind ourselves of the importance of the change and pull ourselves back on track to get moving forward once again.
We might also learn from the process what it is that gets in our way…what triggered the shift? Was it an event that made you more vulnerable? Was it some self-talk that got in your way? Was it that your goal is too big or broad and you need to be more realistic?
Learning more about ourselves is something we do life-long after all.
So here’s to resolving to do a change for a happier New Year to you!
What will you do when you fall of the change horse ride to help yourself get back on and keep riding?
Do Contact Me together in therapy we can explore life coping tools for you to incorporate into your life’s journey!
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I feel rather demoralized when I turn on the news and watch the systematic decline of the nation’s progress towards equality, inclusion and respect for human decency unfolding in front of my eyes.
It’s been an ugly time that I’ve been at odds with and fought fiercely against in my mind. And, just when I thought that perhaps, just perhaps some progress was being made towards a healthier future for us all, the rug was yanked out from underneath me. I didn’t see it coming. I’ve lost my balance. I’ve felt genuinely lost too.
I keep wondering how we’ve come to be in this place at this point in time having not learned from past historical mistakes that we appear to be repeating.
Maybe it’s a fear of change, of lost position, power and privilege for some and a fear of scarcity this change could bring that fuels a drive to hold on to a past way of life and thinking that is old, self serving and out dated.
This is a sad reality to me. Beneath my outrage a deep sadness flows. I’d thought better of us as a nation.
It is our need for love and the connections we make with others that allows us to best cope with the vulnerability our very human experience brings for each one of us. We really don’t do so well when we try to go it alone in life whether as an individual or as a nation. People can end up bullying others to pump up their very fragile shame filled ego. We see this being played out on our national stage.
Fortunately as the year winds to an end people are speaking out against the bullies and abuse of power. The “Me Too” movement is evidence of that. And true leaders in this country are speaking out for climate change action by promising to honor the Paris accord regardless of the short sighted “me only” attitudes of our elected officials. We can find a collective voice and bring the possibility of a future that moves us all forward not backwards.
I grew up with the lyrics of Beatle, John Lennon’s song “Imagine” in my mind and obviously in my heart too. It must have influenced me more that I realize.
“…imagine all the people living for today, imagine there’s no countries, it isn’t hard to do, nothing to kill or die for, and no religion too, imagine all the people living life in peace…no need for greed or hunger, a brotherhood of man, imagine all the people sharing all the world…you may say that I’m a dreamer, but I’m not the only one…”
As Mr. Lennon wrote I too…”hope someday you’ll join us, and the world will live as one!” Just imagine what a wonderful world it would be!
Just what do you “imagine” for the world in 2018 and beyond?
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And slowly a day or two and then three would go by and when I would think of her I’d smile more than I’d cry. With each passing day having lost her has grown a little easier to bear. Those empty spaces she once occupied aren’t as sharply painful to see. Changes in routines have started settling into place.
And we learn to accept what once seemed something beyond our capacity to go on with out.
Part of me hates this adjustment that we make in accommodating a loss into our lives. On one hand it seems so cruel that life just keeps moving forward and that my broken heart will mend. I don’t want to loss to have to be. And on the other hand, it is so very important for me not to cling to that which I can’t have and can’t control and allow life to be what it is.
After all everything is as it is…isn’t it!
And so with each new day it is a little bit easier for me to cherish the joy that Dunkin brought into my life with a smile rather than to wash it away with a tear! For this I am most grateful. It takes time for the grief process to unfold. It just does.
What do you notice about the process of grief in your life?
Do Contact Me together in Grief Therapy we can explore life coping tools for you to incorporate into your life’s journey!
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I have enjoyed writing blog posts and miss the energy it brings to me to do so. It’s like a puzzle. A topic comes to me and my mind goes to work putting the pieces together until it is complete. There is a sense of satisfaction from the finished work with all the parts fitting together nicely. Posting it on my website is the crowning moment for me.
I’ve given myself some badly needed down time this holiday weekend to sit and read and not do a whole bunch. I’ve needed this time to relax and unwind. Creativity and having a relaxed body, mind and spirit are keenly connected for me.
Inspiration can’t be forced. Like the pieces of a puzzle it all has to easily fit together to work well.
What I’ve really needed is to let go and relax and rejuvenate for some creative energy to flow back into me. Perhaps I’ve put my finger on where I left my inspiration after all: back behind all the duties and chores and “to do’s” that have bogged me down and tightened me up.
I do keep learning and relearning exactly what it is that I need. I just wonder where this life’s journey will take me next!
What do you really need to give yourself permission to do to take good care of you?
I’ve noticed at different moments in my life a wonderful sense of being at home. It is a warm familiar comforting feeling sense that overcomes me during which I find myself instantly relaxed mind, body and spirit. When I visit the communities I’ve lived in as an adult I have this sense. Being next to my sister brings it too. When I am at home with my wonderful cats and husband it is home to me. When I am with my parents and in laws I feel at home. I have a dear group of girlfriends I’ve known for over 20 years and when we are together I feel very much at home. My old college roomy who is like another sister brings this feeling when we visit one another too. These are moments I savor when the sensation over comes me.
Recently I had the wonderful opportunity to be with some relatives from my maternal grandfather’s side for a reunion lunch and I felt at one moment very much at home in the midst of people who I’ve known all of my life. It was surprising to experience this wonderful feeling sitting with them and very comforting as well. I don’t see them very often at all anymore but certainly did as a child. I had the fortune of growing up in a smaller community where people stayed so I was afforded the opportunity to have extended family around me often. I am very grateful to have grown up with this way too. There is a richness to my childhood as a result that so many of us today do not get to experience.
I decided at that lunch that I need to take more opportunity to connect with these wonderful relatives as many are aging and won’t be here to enjoy all that much longer. There truly is no place like that feeling of being at home.
What opportunities in your life allow you to feel at home? How can you cultivate more opportunities to experience this phenomenon?
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It is a tender time of year for me. I notice my thoughts are full of the events surrounding my dad’s death and funeral and of memories of him at various times during my life. I miss him of course. And my eyes more easily well up with tears.
I don’t feel the depth of my grief of losing him as often as I did in the past. Dunkin’s death this summer gave me an opportunity to think of and feel my grief about losing my dad as well…new loss is a reminder of old losses. But the sadness in my heart it seems has lightened some.
This anniversary time is an opportunity to release more of that deeper pain that rests inside that wounded heart of mine. I am once again reminded of how exhausting grieving is and just how breath stopping the throbs of pain can be. It’s all part of the process it just is.
We certainly don’t forget those we’ve lost. With time, we do figure out how to live a life without them in it. Initially it doesn’t seem possible this could ever happen and we certainly don’t want for it to happen either. But we do somehow go on as hard as that is to reconcile initially.
There are more memories and tears to come this week. And, I am allowing myself the space I need to let them come too. This fourth anniversary brings these gifts: the opportunity to release more of my grief and the recognition my heart has been healing.
What do you do to honor your loved one and heal your grieving heart when you face a loss anniversary?
Do Contact Me together in Grief Therapy we can explore life coping tools for you to incorporate into your life’s journey!
We had to say a very sad goodbye to our little Dunkin kitty on July 10th and our house has not been the same. There are so many empty spaces that furry little one once filled. I see her in my mind’s eye lying in her spots on our bed, in her favorite chair and on the heat duct in the bedroom where she once slept. She’s with me now only in my memory in the morning and evening while I’m in the bathroom. She would burst into the bathroom announcing her arrival and demand some attention as only Dunkin could do. I miss her very much.
Dunkin was a kitty so full of life and so in the moment; so joyful and graceful as she danced around the house. It was very painful to see her decline so very quickly in just one week’s time. Despite multiple trips to the vet and my attentive nursing care at home it just was her time to leave us.
We learned when Dunkin was 3 that she had one smaller than normal kidney and the other miss shaped. Her favorite vet let us know that cats with kidney problems generally don’t live a long life. I promptly dismissed that reality until I recalled what he told us two weeks after she died.
I suspect she took the vets words to heart for she lived each day with great gusto during her 12 ½ years with us. I only hope the care she received from us allowed her a longer than anticipated life.
There is an 8 pound black furry hole in my heart and many empty spaces that only my memory can now fill. Dunkin brought us smiles and her absence has brought many many tears.
Dearest little Dunkin pumpkin we sure love and miss you!
I miss you Dad and really can’t believe this is the fourth Father’s Day without you here. It seems like only yesterday you were home with Mom tending your strawberries and tomatoes and working hard as you always would do.
Time keeps speeding along and life does keep on going. There is however an empty space that only you can fill with the sound of your laughter and warmth of your hug. It’s just not the same without you.
I treasure my memories of life with you in it. There is comfort when I look back even through my tears. I appreciate all you did for your family and the stability you provided for us. I could count on you. I knew you were there for me.
I am very grateful to have been given you as my Dad!
I love you-
Jude
