Category Archives: spiritual

Got Milk?

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For the greater part of my life I have lived in a small town.  I branched out into the bustling metropolis for a few years to attend college but the pull of our tight-knit community was too strong to ignore and I came home.  Much to the chagrin of my city dwelling friends, I have never regretted that decision.

There is something comforting about seeing the same people on a day-to-day basis.  It may feel a little too close for comfort at times when they know more about your life than you do but it has become the safety blanket of my existence.  The community that began as a collection of strangers rapidly transformed into an extended family and I take solace in the fact that I could knock on any door and receive the same warm welcome from any one of them.

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The milk of human kindness flows more freely in a small town – at least that has been my experience.  And in the summer of 2013 that lesson was inked into my skin in colors more vivid than any tattoo.   My mother had a slight episode while on her scooter as she was making her way home from her shopping excursion.  Her dog had broken free from her collar and, in the chaos that ensued, my mother had toppled from her scooter and lay on her back on the pavement.  As fate would have it I was driving through town just as the mishap occurred and I was able to pull over and help.

In the time it took for me to pull over, a handful of people were already either assisting my mother or madly looking for the frenzied dog that was dodging parked cars and moving vehicles.  It was controlled chaos but in the end my mom was fine and the dog was recovered without incident.

There is an overwhelmingly consolatory feeling knowing that if I had not been there my mother would have been just as vigilantly attended to and things would have still ended well.  Knowing that the milk of human kindness flows freely through the veins of my community makes me glad that I made the decision to carve my life into the growing trunk of the tree in this rural atmosphere.

There may be moments of my life that I will look back on with regret but choosing to live my life in this town and the community of people I share it with is not one of them.

My only wish, especially now, is that the kindness we experience here could be broadcast on a much grander level.  Whatever happens in this world, we must not let the anger and hatred of the few be able to quell the kindness that resides in the many.   Fight hate with love and keep your hearts open.  The more we hate, the more they win.

 

What the world needs now

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I am feeling very reflective today, about life and the way people treat each other and this quote seems to sum up my mood completely.

audrey

For attractive lips, speak words of kindness. For lovely eyes, seek out the good in people. For a slim figure, share your food with the hungry. For beautiful hair, let a child run his / her hands through it once a day. For poise, walk with the knowledge that you never walk alone. People, more than things, have to be restored, renewed, revived, reclaimed, and redeemed, never throw out anyone. Remember, if you ever need a helping hand, you will find one at the end of each of your arms. As you grow older, you will discover that you have two hands; one for helping yourself, and the other for helping others. Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind, don’t matter and those who matter, don’t mind.”

~ Audrey Hepburn

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The colors of my memories

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My umbrella could not protect me

from the rain that would come.

Like a tsunami of emotion,

sadness hit me with a fury,

threatening to pull me into its current

and drown me in its torrents.

Some days the emotion feels heavy, oppressive,

like wax dripping on canvas,

and the thin veil of my resolve is not enough

to shield me from the pain of loss.

wax on canvas

But on the good days,

I can bathe in the colors of that storm.

I am the black and white character

wading into a flushed prism of good memories

and I no longer feel alone.

Although you are not physically here with me,

your brush still adds a splash of life to my canvas

and those hues make me feel connected again.

How good it feels

to walk through the reminiscence of you.

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The things we were meant to find beautiful

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They grab my attention

and hold me in their embrace.

Chasing them to catch just the right shot

is like chasing the illusion of perfection.

Their shapes, like our lives, can change in an instant

also changing our perspective.

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Once you adjust your position

the view is never the same.

The closer you get to something,

the more beautiful it becomes.

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Sometimes, if you are lucky,

the view is so much better than you anticipated

and those moments should be savored,

breathed in like a fine wine.

 Our destiny is written in the sky,

our hope, painted on the largest canvas possible

but our dreams can change in a whisper.

Although the wind may alter the portrait,

perhaps it was meant to change.

Just maybe, life is as big as the sky

and those clouds should be the cherished blessings

of the things we were meant to find beautiful.

Turns out I’m not the biggest loser

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For the past month I have been diligently somewhat enthusiastically following a strict regimen of caloric intake to participate in a weight loss challenge (#wlc) with my best friend and her husband.  I have made many sacrifices and changed my shopping lists multiple times to adhere to the necessary guidelines of not eating food I should not be eating.  After thirty days, we have all weighed in and, although I am proud of my accomplishment, Daniel won the battle.

The deal going in was that the “losers” had to eat what the victor had been using as nourishment during the challenge.  Daniel decided to change the rules and we had to succumb, I’ll admit enthusiastically, to a double cheeseburger today.  Once the arbitrary new guideline had been established, I hungrily began making my shopping list for dinner.  I already had frozen burger patties in my freezer but the necessary garnishes were required to complete my meal.

I felt like a thief, looking over my shoulder across the parking lot, as I smuggled my contraband ingredients to my car.  The jar of pickles, processed cheese slices and bun lay hidden in my grocery store bag as I tried to conceal my guilt on the way to my car.  I have been known to cook several very upscale meals but, when it comes to my burger, my cheese of choice is synthetic Kraft Singles and nothing else will do!

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The burgers were cooked perfectly.  The pickles were just as salty as I remembered and the almost-real cheese dripped from the burger patties just as it should have.  My dinner was delicious and the anticipated two extra pounds were worth it.

As I say my “White Rabbit” three times tonight at the stroke of midnight, I can only hope luck will find me once again this month and continue the trend of shedding pounds.  I may not be the biggest loser but I’m still a loser, and I’m okay with that.

It was a bad math exam

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I lived through a very tumultuous marriage.  It was a great lesson for me but, in mathematical terms, the product of my relationship was divided by the sum of our differences and eventually created a result that lacked a remainder.   There were so many variables and so few constants that our bond was doomed from the beginning.  I should have been the operator but, instead, I felt like a fraction of my true self.

The formula for a successful bond relies on a form of symmetry.  The arrangement of the most fundamental parts of our lives need to align to create a true collaborative bond.  You cannot expect to live a happy life in a paradox.  You cannot create an answerable question without supplying the linear equation that gives you those answers.  All of the pieces of your life need to make you happy, not just the sum of the happy parts.  Going through the motions and cancelling out the negative parts of the bigger picture subtracts from the value of each day.  Sure you will make mistakes along the way, but those mistakes should add to your education and not take away from your self-worth.

I lived that equation.  The perfect number may exist in the glossary of mathematical terms but it does not thrive in real life.  Perfection takes effort and, at the end of the exam, all of the negatives never added up to a positive for me.  I was in the wrong equation and it was glaringly evident.  It was time to subtract myself and cut my losses.

math equation

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Once my math exam was over I learned to breathe freely again and I felt empowered by my freedom.  I learned to enjoy my own company more than I ever had and it was liberating.  What I currently perceive as solitude some would call loneliness but they don’t have the numbers to back up their hypothesis.

I now spend my days knowing that I passed that math test and that my final grade has truly helped me balance my life in a way that I never thought possible.  And now that I have erased the errors of my past, I am free to create a new formula for my happiness.  I can choose to remain constant or I can choose to add or subtract the things that will bring me the most happiness.  Regardless of what I choose, I know I will only add the people who fill the gaps in my life and not those who subtract from my bliss.

You can’t live a positive life with a negative mind

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I am thankful I have always been a realistic person with a penchant for the optimistic side of the scale.  I have never been one to dwell on the unfavorable circumstances I have lived through but I have chosen to use those unfortunate times as lessons, and there have been many.  I could have opted to wallow in my misery but I continued forward, leaving those inopportune moments to collect dust while I moved on.  Had I allowed myself to exist in those adverse periods of my past, I would be in a very different place in my life today.

I am who I am because things in my life went wrong.  But I am also who I am because of how I handled those things with a positive attitude.  Even the most successful people have endured monumental setbacks.  These moments are how life teaches us to be better people and these moments are why hope exists.  That beacon of light in the darkness of our reality shines to draw us from the negativity that is ready to envelop us if we let it.

Optimistic minds see a glass as half full but truly positive minds will disregard that glass completely and only focus on its contents.  There is no line and, if you take away the glass, there is no halfway mark.  There is only the reality of what was in the glass in the first place.

no glass at all

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We need to embrace the messy, broken glass of our crazy lives and we need to drain every favorable ounce of life out of the remains when the glass is removed.  The substance inside the glass is what we focused on in the first place and, regardless of how it sat in the glass, it remains the positive part of the bigger picture.

Life is unpredictable.  Life will try to dampen your spirits and cloud your skies.  But life will always show you the rainbow if you are willing to see it.

I’m hearing the voices again….

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I have had a debate going on in my head for a long time.  I am a very spiritual person but I don’t devote myself to a particular religion. I don’t grace the interior of a church on a regular basis but I do believe in a higher power and life beyond this place we call our reality.

As I child I had a few “imaginary” friends.  I don’t recall their names, nor do I remember how long they graced me with their presence but I know, undoubtedly, that they were there.  I watched a movie years ago called ‘Heart and Souls’ with Robert Downey Jr. and the discussion I was used to only having in my head came barreling, full force, into my here and now.  Perhaps the innocence of my childhood allowed me to hear things beyond my three-dimensional limitations.  Just maybe my mind was permitted to be open to hearing the spirits that chose to help me on my journey through this physical world and those voices in my head were not merely conjured by childhood imagination.

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Similar to the plot line in the movie, those sounds in my head were slowly extinguished as I got older.  As my childhood innocence was replaced by teenage angst and the stress of being a young adult, the voices were unable to permeate the reality that had stolen my youth.  My ability to connect with those ethereal intonations was replaced by the clanging, brash sounds of adulthood.

I have been to mediums and people who are able to channel the spirits of those who have moved beyond the physical world.  Some have been a pure hoax and some have been truly blessed with the ability to connect with those voices that wait patiently on the other side for those who are able to hear them and willing to listen.  Through those people I have learned more about spirit guides and souls who have passed but are still connected to my soul.

I can occasionally hear those murmurs again.  Faint whispers land gently on my ears, each with their own unique way of communicating.  I like to believe that those voices have always been with me but I became too surrounded by the cacophony of life to hear them.  I take solace in the fact that I am never truly alone and if I listen closely enough, if I really stretch myself beyond the closed walls of my mind, the whispers of those friends and family will follow me through this journey into whatever adventures lay in wait for me after this one.

 

Putting the focus back on me

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“Always remember, your focus determines your reality.” ~ George Lucas

I have been neglecting myself lately.  And my 24-hour period of sleep last week was a glaring reminder that I must slow down and begin to put my needs ahead of everyone else’s needs.  I am still fending off the same cold that knocked me down last week and I am hoping after two consecutive days off that my body will begin to heal itself.

My physical condition withstanding, I have also realized how many things I have put on the back burner over the last few months.  My blog posts  have been suffering.  My blog reading has been non-existent.  And the things I love doing, like making soup or reading a book, have been put on a shelf and left to collect dust.

But today, that momentum has shifted.  I am making myself a “vision board” so I can focus on the things I want to do for myself.  I have sketched and decided on a design that I am going to have tattooed on my wrist.  I have been thinking about it for a while but have finally given myself permission to take that leap.

Tattoo

The infinity symbol is a message of empowerment – anything is possible.  Carpe Diem is, not only my email address but, my mantra – seize the day, something I have been failing to do recently.  The butterfly represents my mother and the owl represents my father.  It is a perfect blend of all the things that have the most power over the person I am each day and the person I want to continue being.

On day one of my two days off, I currently have two different pots of soup simmering on the stove, the ingredients for a killer Chili in the fridge and my fingers are flying over the keyboard as I type this post.  I feel like I am finding myself again.  I feel happy knowing I have begun to assimilate to the creature I enjoy being.  And I feel the most elation by knowing that I have retrained my focus and begun to put myself first.