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Monday, July 14, 2008

TEN SIGNS THAT YOU TAKE YOURSELF TOO SERIOUSLY

1. Your favorite item is taken off the menu at a restaurant you frequent. You spend the entire meal complaining about it and decide you'll never come back.

2. Someone in your circle makes a mistake. You take this as a personal affront and spend 20 minutes berating them. During the span of time that you were raving, they could have corrected the simple, inadvertent error 9 times.

3. You update everyone you know about all of your ailments and problems in great detail, and often.

4. You assume your way of thinking is the only one out there and you get offended if people think differently than you.

5. You KNOW you're right.

6. Your conversation is peppered with phrases like, "That's nothing", "Am I right? ", "You should", "The right way to do it is", "that's stupid!" and "Why would you do that?"

7. You get upset when people don't know what you need, want, think and feel, even though you haven't told them.

8. You think "active listening" is when you let someone finish their sentence before moving on to your point.

9. You judge people frequently and voice that judgement to anyone who cares to listen.

10. You're offended at this list and assume I wrote it about you.

Saturday, July 12, 2008

Getting There

Live Simply
Live Green
Trust God
Wish the very best for everyone I encounter
Have fun
Don't procrastinate
Do it with passion or don't do it at all
Walk my truth no matter what
Show compassion
Be Patient
Notice the beauty in nature
Be thankful
Be a very good friend
Don't take myself too seriously

Wednesday, July 2, 2008

Looking on the Bright Side

Lately I have had the opportunity to reflect on having a positive attitude. You can call it "glass half full/glass half empty" or any of the other common cliches that exist.

What it really amounts to is that every moment we live is an opportunity. We cannot always control what happens to us. What we do have control over is how we react to those occurrences in our lives.

I have known some very positive people over the years. These are the folks I used to think of as "too happy" or "unrealistic". They never complain when something goes poorly. They are invariably pleasant to those around them. Many have overcome amazing odds and have added so much to our world despite harrowing circumstances that have happened in their lives.

I have also encountered my share of the folks who look at the glass as half empty. Everything that happens is filtered through the lens of "my life is so bad, things don't go well for me, it's not fair....." As these folks complain, it seems more and more negative things DO happen to them. It's as if negativity begets more negativity - almost as if the universe sends them each day what they send out. It becomes a self fulfilling prophecy, and they can say "See! I told you my life was terrible!"

I have, during my life, waffled between these two positions. I definitely spent my share of time in the half empty court.

I have made a decision to no longer live there. I decide how I feel and react every day, no one else. I can choose, each and every day, how my day will go. Whether I run out of gas, or the cafeteria closes before I get my lunch, I can choose my reaction.

This is invariably a process. It has helped that many of us at work have joined "A Complaint Free World" together. The aim is to learn, together, to eliminate pointless complaining from our day to day lives. This process does seem to help, since we are all working on it together. Having the visual, and the process of moving the purple bracelet from my right wrist (right attitude) to my left upon indulging my complaining really helps to illustrate just how much I was complaining each day!

And so, I will continue to look for the positive. I will keep finding the silver lining. I will continue to choose to avoid negativity. And I will STOP once and for all throwing "Oh Poor Me, life doesn't go the way I want it to" out into the Universe. Because I am a firm believer that the Universe operates like a giant boomerang.

What you throw out there comes right back atcha so watch what you're dishing out folks!

Friendship

What does Friendship mean to me?

Friendship means helping your friend when you don't feel like it, even when you're tired, stressed, or overworked.

Friendship means balancing honesty and the ability to understand why something is so important to your friend.

Friendship is supporting your friend in her endeavors and being her loudest cheerleader when she is successful. It also means being there to pick her up if she falls on her face.

Friendship is being able to say "OK - reel it in there bitchy one."

Friendship is letting your friend know when she's mucking up her life.

Friendship is listening.

Friendship is being a shoulder to cry on.

Friendship means I can hear what you say to me when I need a good dose of reality.

Friendship is having your priorities in order. Do you want "She was a dutiful employee" as your epitaph?

If it's important to you, it's important to me.

If I say something to you or about you it should be to build you up, not tear you down.

Thank you for teaching me about Friendship.

Monday, June 30, 2008

Daisies In A Vase

We're driving up West Main Street on a dark and stormy evening in early June. It's getting late, and we're both sleepy. As Rob navigates the pickup through the rain, I look to my right. I have noticed this house in passing before, the way one glances at other people's homes as you drive through town. The lawn, the flowers, trees and shrubberies, as well as the house itself are a pleasure to look at. This is clearly a home, a well loved, well kept home. Tonight the porch light is on. The bright light shining on the porch illuminates a large vase of bright, beautiful daisies, a contrast to the dark, rainy night. As I look at the daisies, I picture who might live there. I can picture a boy of perhaps 7 or 8, carefully handing the vase to his Grandmother earlier that afternoon. I can see her stroking his hair, and smiling her thanks, proclaiming that the beautiful blooms must be placed right on the front porch where everyone will be able to see them! This little snippet in time, looking at my neighbor's daisies reminds me that these seemingly small wonders are the blessings that make life grand. There are so many simple pleasures for us to enjoy every day, if we only look around us.

Monday, April 14, 2008

Truths About Getting Ready for Work

(1) When you are getting ready for work, your cat will do everything in his power to sabotage this process. It is a matter of pride for Fluffy to get fur on your outfit every day. And you really should have known that laptop case made a great cat bed.

(2) Only your husband is better at getting in your way in the morning than the cat. When you are brushing your teeth, he will need the bathroom. When you are making tea, he will move your tea cup and make his lunch. He will cross the kitchen no less than 15 times during this process, making a separate trip for each item going in and coming out of the fridge.

(3) While you are simultaneously fixing your hair and figuring out what to do about that project at work, your husband will yell "Honey, where are my shoes?" As you ask yourself why he thinks you would know this, you notice there's a huge toothpaste stain on your blouse.

(4) If you put on one blue shoe and one black shoe, you will not notice until your cubicle mate tells the entire office about it.

(5) When your son was a little boy, you could never get him to go to sleep. You have now entered that phase of life where remembering your son as "awake" is a distant memory. He sleeps more than anyone you know. You'll have to call him 4 times this morning to wake him.

(6) You packed a nice healthy lunch this morning. You will be pulling into the parking lot at work before you realize it is still on the kitchen counter.

(7) Every day that same guy from the department upstairs arrives just before you and takes the last good parking spot near the building. You think to yourself if you arrived an hour early, he'd somehow know, and still beat you there.

As you walk into the building at work, where your job description resembles the Genie in "Aladdin" (think "Poof, what do you need, Poof what do you need, Poof, what do you need") you realize that if these are the worst of your problems, you've got a pretty darn great life after all.

Thursday, April 3, 2008

Home

What is "home" to me? It is a place inside of me. A feeling, deep inside, that all is right with the world.

I have found home in many places over the years. We lived in many apartment buildings during my childhood. My dad worked very hard and doted on me. My mother loved and nourished everyone and showed it in her care for us and the house. I had my own room in each apartment, my own space, which has always been important to me. I always arranged and decorated it the way I liked, and felt that my room reflected "me."

There were wonderful neighborhoods, with more children running and bike riding than cars on the street. I spent as much time at my best friend's home as at my own. The park, the lake, the corner store, the bus to the nearby small city for shopping, all were at our disposal.

Because of moving so often, I became very good at "nesting" where I landed. I still do this now, whether it is a new home, a new office, or a temporary space such as a guest room for a weekend at a relative's house. I will instantly set out to organize my things and make the space "mine." Once I have done so, I will go and locate everyone and spend time with them. I love sitting for hours over tea, or a good bottle of wine, talking from the heart. I've happily lost much sleep over the years this way!

As a child, I was close to my parents and brother and my best friend, as well as one other good friend. I was happy and felt at home with them.

After high school I went to work. I became involved with a young adults christian group. We were a very intense group who forged strong bonds with each other. We loved each other, having fun, and worshipping God together. These people, many of whom are still my friends, became very important to me. When we were together, hands raised, singing and praising, I was home.

One lovely result of this group was that I met my husband there. My husband is a true "home town boy", something referred to around here as a "TOWNIE". He could never imagine living anywhere but here in his hometown, a place which now also holds my heart. Luckily, I fell for him, hard and deep. My heart was and is with him, and if here is where he wants to be, then here is home.

Home for me can also be a feeling, or a situation. When I go to Walden Woods or Quabbin Reservoir, two wilderness areas here in Massachusetts, I can be totally alone there, and be completely at home. The comfort and overwhelming awe I always feel in nature has always given me a feeling of home.

Music is also home. Some artists have a special gift of touching something deep down inside of us. I can listen to some pieces of music and I am home, no matter where I am. This can happen with any kind of music for me, from classical to broadway, from Stevie Ray Vaughan, to Metallica, country music, or Rogers and Hammerstein. I have always had a strong affinity for music and it is as much a part of me as breathing, and to me the right song is home.

So, for me home is inside. I know who I am, where I belong. I am a small part of this creation, and all of us are vitally important. I want to stay around here, my home, as long as possible, and connect with as many people as I can.

Running From It

Fate
Or change
Driven toward a goal
Truth
And pain
Flavored by your soul
The fantasy is open
Reality has fled
The carnival is coming
Greet them in your head
It’s too hard
I can’t
I won’t go, you say
If you don’t
Your life is naught
The end of this, your play

Journey

Patient
Waiting
Craving More
Carving out a brand new door
Questing, prying, one more time
Chanting, screaming, intertwined

Freedom

Freedom
Live authentically
Walk your path
Be who you are
No excuses
Brave!
This is the real me
Who I really am
I must walk my path
I do hope we can continue to walk together
All of us
Because this is my path, and I must walk it

For one who is afraid to live

Telling me no
you don't even know why
You've come undone
Afraid to fly
Cabbage for dreams
Silent screams
You filter your life
and hang on tight
Fear is your mantra
The familiar your friend
Even if it's not working
You won't even bend
Contorting and twisting
Control you must have
The time you are wasting
You can never take back

An Argument with the Self

Cans full of hope
Who took my can opener?
The label looks delicious
I can’t get in there
Probably not good for me anyway
Too rich for my system, right?
I’ll stick with this old crust here

Yeah, if you want things this way
So, do you like it like this?
It certainly seems like it sometimes
You have control
You can feel sorry for yourself
That’s easier
Generate pity
Poor you, right?
Give me a break
You don’t like your life?
Get off your ass and change it

The Wrong Kind of Compromise

I am finished with the particular brand of compromise I have been subscribing to for most of my adult life.

No more.

I thought that in order to follow Christ, I had to do what everyone else wanted me to do, always. I always acquiesced to others wishes, no matter what the situation. I have discovered that I had it all wrong.

When you don't walk your own path, when you ignore your truth, you lessen yourself. When you lessen yourself you have nothing worthwhile to share with or to give to others.

From this point on, I decide what I do with my life.

Where I work.
What hours I keep.
What groups I join.
What I do with my spare time.
Whether I hold positions of leadership or not.
What I write about and when
What I eat
How my home looks
What I accept in my life
What I reject as unacceptable

From here on in, I decide. This is the real me. Take it - and remain in my life, or leave it, and do not remain in my life.

Your choice.