I have a good friend who recently shared some insecurity around her driving abilities. Last week, while on our way to a movie, she remarked that her father, among others, have always criticized her driving, and although I wouldn’t label her a bad driver, apparently that’s what she considers herself to be.
Since first mentioning it a few weeks ago, I’ve learned she’s had eight car accidents in less than twenty years. I’ve also noticed she often hesitates when making decisions to shift lanes or accelerate through an intersection. All of these details have been marinating in my mind. What I’ve concluded is that there’s no such thing as a bad driver.
How many times have I told myself I was “bad” at something. A bad homeowner. A bad housekeeper. I’ve labeled myself a bad organizer. A bad time manager. Saying you’re “bad” at something is nothing but ego trying to keep you from having peace.
If it can convince you that you’re a “bad” organizer, that gives you a reason to beat yourself up when you can’t find something you need. Why not ask a friend who’s good at organizing to help you out or even pay someone to offer pointers so you can build your confidence?
If ego can persuade you that you’re “bad” at home repairs, you stay locked in a vicious circle of feeling guilty that something’s not been fixed and criticizing yourself for not being able to do it. The truth is, there are plenty of ways to learn how to make simple home repairs. Maybe you just need to admit you don’t like to do home repairs.
I’ve accepted the fact that I don’t like doing housework or home repairs, and I’m OK with it. After spending a sufficient amount of time feeling bad about being disorganized or out of time, I’ve sought the knowledge I need to increase my skill level and have been working on it – even if it seems an extraordinarily slow process.
Calling yourself “bad” at doing something is a copout. When you judge yourself instead of choosing to ask for help or admitting you don’t want to do something, you’re setting yourself up for ego to be in control. And that’s chaos – guaranteed.
Tags: acim, chaos, ego, inspirational, peace, self-improvement, spirit, spirituality
Sun, November 1 2009 » Insights » 1 Comment
I felt paralyzed yesterday. I didn’t know what was causing it, but I knew that sitting at the computer pretending I was accomplishing anything besides lurking on Facebook was ridiculous. Fortunately, I’ve learned that the quickest way to transcend any state is to be in it. With my ego screaming, “You have so much to do!” I stepped away from the computer.
I asked myself what the deal was. Sure, there was a lot going on, but isn’t there always? After talking to a good friend who understands the potholes and pitfalls on this journey, I realized that the paralysis was just another ego tactic to keep me from having what I want. And what I want is to sell my house. “Decide what you want and watch the Universe handle it,” Rita said.
Without realizing it, my ego had created a daunting scenario about what selling the house and moving would entail. It compiled every moving experience I’ve had, added each time I’ve ended up on the short end of the financial stick and created an image so unappealing that it seemed a better idea to stay put, even though I wasn’t happy.
What I really want is to live in an apartment – to take the conscious energy that I’ve spent taking care of this house and the unconscious energy I’ve expended worrying that I wasn’t doing a good enough job and put it toward what I love doing – writing, speaking, and creating.
This morning I searched the real estate listings on Craig’s List and planned to check out e-Bay this afternoon. Then, in the middle of writing this blog, the phone rang. It was the real estate agent I talked to four months ago when I first thought about selling. She was calling to “check in.”
I don’t know what’s in store. But I do know that owning what I want is already opening doors I can’t see and creating circumstances that go far beyond the appearances in front of me in this moment.
Tags: acim, ego, insight, inspiration, moving, peace, self-improvement, spirituality
Wed, October 21 2009 » Insights » No Comments
Yahoo posted an article this week on the 5 Rules of Getting Over a Breakup. One of tips said:
Remember how things, like stupid songs and movies and that little spot in the park that you two went to on your first date used to be “yours”? Well, they’re not anymore. Don’t make a connection to platonic objects when there isn’t one. Remind yourself that you like that spot in the park because of the good view, not because of anyone connected to it.
“No!” I screamed at the computer. “You’ve got it all wrong.” No song, no place, no movie was ever “yours.” You just told yourself they were. Second, reminding yourself that you like the spot in the park because of its good view serves no purpose other than throwing down the gauntlet for ego because it is still attached to what you told yourself it meant and it will fight you every step of the way to hold on to that belief.
The part about not making a connection to objects points in the right direction, but what you have to get to first is awareness about what you told yourself all of those things meant, and chances are they all lead to believing you’re “special.” Ego loves to perceive that you’re “special” and most romantic relationships feed that perception. Until it’s over.
The suffering doesn’t come from “missing” the other person. It comes from the realization that most of the things you convinced yourself were true are not. The key to getting over a break up is to remove the meaning you’ve assigned to everything that happened while you were in the relationship.
When you tell yourself that little spot in the park is “special” because it was the birthplace of your “love”, that it signified the beginning of what was to be the best relationship of your life, or that it was where you discovered the one person who was meant to love you “this way”, you have set yourself up for suffering and disappointment.
The truth is nothing means anything until you say it means something. You have the power to choose whether you give any experience meaning – good or bad. It’s so much easier to remove the meaning from the “bad” experiences. Or make it about the other person. But it’s just as important to detach from the meaning you’ve given to the “good” ones.
Assigning meaning is an ego game designed solely to create misery. We all do it. However, when you’re able to be aware of when you’re doing it and detach before it anchors in your subconscious, you’re free to be completely present and enjoy each moment in the relationship. If and when it becomes clear it’s time to part ways, there is a lot less suffering. It requires a lot of energy to be this aware. But if you’re half as committed to it as you were to the relationship, you’ll find a peace that’s not revealed any other way. That’s how you really “get over” a break up.
Tags: break-up, ego, peace, relationships, self-improvement
Wed, October 14 2009 » Insights » No Comments
If you saw someone standing in the garden criticizing a tiny tomato sprout because it didn’t have any tomatoes on it yet, you’d think she was insane. Right? And yet we do it all the time – instead of rejoicing in the small signs of growth in our lives, we get frustrated and impatient that “the” result hasn’t occurred.
I’ve read that tomato plant analogy in Louise Hay’s book You Can Heal Your Life countless times. For some reason this morning, it really struck a chord. As I find myself in a familiar, yet completely different place, in my professional life, I realize how much I don’t want to do that anymore.
Instead of searching for signs of success and then allowing ego to convince me they’re not enough, I want to celebrate where I stand in this moment. Rather than wishing things were progressing more quickly, I want to relish each experience.
I wasted so much time over the last ten years allowing ego to yank me into the future and drag me back to the past. I didn’t know better then. Now I do. Now the choice is conscious. And I choose to look at that tiny tomato sprout and acknowledge all that is right now. Because that is enough.
Tags: acceptance, career, ego, peace, professional
Tue, October 6 2009 » Insights » 1 Comment
I have been the queen of “To-Do” lists for a long time, jotting down every tiny thing that needs to be done – from work tasks to emptying the dishwasher. I’ve even been known to add things that I’ve already done just so I can cross them off.
So when I realized I hadn’t made a list in weeks, I was intrigued. Of course, my ego put in its two cents: That’s why you feel like nothing’s gotten done. You haven’t accomplished nearly as much as you could have if you had a list. You’ve just been lazy.
As I wrote in my journal the other day, I found myself writing Make A To-Do List. The distaste I felt was immediate and I observed my hand as something inside me guided the pen up the page and turned the “O’s” into “A’s.” I had made the To-Do list into a Ta-Da list.
This is when it all became clear. A To-Do list is an ego set-up to feel bad. When did I ever get everything done? That would be never. There was always more. I was constantly adding to it. Having a To-Do list made me feel like the proverbial gerbil who goes round and round without ever getting anywhere. In other words, a failure.
A Ta-Da list on the other hand is quite different. It encourages me to celebrate each tiny achievement. Whether I clean the toilet or complete the information kit for the new book, I get to rejoice instead of merely crossing off another mundane item. It makes me feel good, not think, “What’s next?”
Now this blog is complete. Ta-da!
Tags: ego, inspiration, peace, time, time management, to-do
Tue, September 29 2009 » Insights » 5 Comments
The herd of pink elephants in the healthcare reform arena is worthy of Ringling Brothers. One by one they march around in circles while we focus on the symptoms and not the problem. It’s as effective as putting a Band-aid on a sucking chest wound.
The first elephant in the parade is the inequality of healthcare recipients. People who reside in the lower castes of our economic system, and rely on support from the government to eat, do not shop at Whole Foods. Because it’s cheaper and often more filling, they’ve become addicted to Ring Dings, Hot Pockets, and, as my friend Joyce calls it, monkey junk. Even if with more money for groceries, without a plan for long-term education, the only result will be more profits for the makers of Ring Dings and Hot Pockets.
Secondly, those in this category are not prone to exercise. When you’re worrying if there’s enough peanut butter and jelly to make sandwiches for your kids’ lunches, going out for a jog is not at the top of your priority list. Exercise for the sake of exercise is a foreign concept to many of the cultures that comprise this group and an enormous commitment to education would be necessary to affect change of any kind.
The next elephant is the fact that most people in the country do whatever is necessary to run away from their feelings through all kinds of unhealthy habits – from smoking to drinking to overeating to watching television 40 hours a week. It’s not the bad habits that lead to poor health. Poor health comes from the unfelt emotions that create bad habits.
Gender is the third elephant. I have friends who practically have to hog tie their husbands or lure them with the promise of wings and beer to get them to the doctor. Perhaps because women get used to going to the gynecologist at a young age (because we’re primarily responsible for birth control, but that’s another story), we don’t suffer from the anxiety level that many men do. Regardless, it’s a factor.
Although government management of healthcare is an elephant that hasn’t been completely ignored, the motivation in recognizing it is fear of the cost. The real issue is because it would be a disaster. It already is. Making good choices about Medicare providers requires the tenacity of Lewis and Clark and the mental agility of a world champion chess player.
Then there’s Medicaid, whose doctors get paid paltry sums for primary care patient visits. I’ve seen figures ranging from $25 to $75, and I’ve been told in Florida, it’s closer to $15. From personal experience, I can attest that this means that if you’re poor, health care is provided by doctors who need to have 4,000 patients on their rosters to make anywhere near what their colleagues earn. Or they have lucrative weightloss or “skincare” clinics that allow them to see patients once a week while the other days are staffed by nurse practioners. Most get burned out and burned up and it takes a very special Medicaid doctor for people to leave the office feeling better.
Leading this silent pack is the reality that the very existence of insurance and pharmaceutical companies is dependent on people being sick. The fact that insurance companies are reluctant to pay for preventative care has nothing to do with efficacy and everything to do with fear. What would they do if everyone were healthy? They have a vested interest in making sure people get and stay ill.
Instead of trusting that using premium dollars to help people become healthy could create an energy that would be contagious, they bemoan expensive claims and small profits to justify denying coverage, and as an explanation for why a woman who’s undergone a mastectomy gets a mere 23 hours in the hospital.
What’s being bandied about Congress is not healthcare reform. Reform means calling out the elephants one at a time and dealing with each one before instituting any formal program. Any healthcare plan implemented without acknowledging and dealing with all of these issues is destined to fail.
The truth is, history will probably repeat itself and the elephants will be ignored. Some type of plan will be passed by Congress and the president held completely accountable when it fails. Why? Because we don’t really want equality. Who would there be to look down upon? To “help” because we need affirmation that we’re better off? Besides, we don’t want to be healthy. We’d rather hold onto our aches and pains and illnesses because we perceive they bond us. What would there be to talk about if we were all well? Let’s see someone take a bite of that elephant.
Tags: health care, healthcare, healthcare reform, truth
Mon, September 7 2009 » Thoughts » No Comments
My friend Joyce experienced a bout of sciatica last week. The day I found out, I asked her what she needed and rearranged my day so I could take some supplies and medicine to her. I called the next morning to see how she was feeling and realized that lately, when I call it’s to check up on her health – not to say hello or see how she’s doing.
As I digested this information, I thought, what kind of message does that send? I would never want her to think she’s only thought about or valued when she’s not well. Yet, reaching out mostly on those occasions does have that subtext, whether either of us realizes or not.
Our society, as a whole, pays so much more attention to those who suffer than those who express joy. I guess we figure that those who are happy don’t need acknowledgement and love as much as those who aren’t. But what a belief system that sets up. By valuing suffering we say, “This is how to get the expression of love and comfort I want.”
From only reaching out to friends or family when we perceive they’re suffering to companies that market or advertise products and services to make you “feel better,” we are a culture invested in feeling bad. Just watch TV or listen to the radio for an hour. The abundance of ads for medications designed to make us feel better – Ambien, Prozac, Ablify – and fast food places like McDonalds, who pitch crappy, albeit yummy food, prove we are a population starving to feel better. And we buy it, so if only for a moment, we can be comforted by the special sauce sliding down our collective throat.
I still value compassion, but what if we asked ourselves, how can we validate joy? How we can steer a conversation away from suffering and focus instead on ways to find joy and peace in our experiences?
There are so many ways we affirm suffering. From enrolling in others’ drama to focusing on the negative. From talking about how “bad” things are to watching the evening news. We use suffering to bond with each other – author Caroline Myss calls the behavior “woundology” in her book The Anatomy of Spirit.
I want to see all the ways I can affirm joy, growth and faith. Celebrating with a friend when she has an insight that allows her to change a habit. Acknowledging a hurdle overcome. Congratulating someone who has worked hard to stand where she is. Out of the blue. Just because. I think I’ll go call Joyce.
Tags: compassion, joy, love, peace, self-improvement, spirituality, suffering, yoga
Mon, August 24 2009 » Insights » 4 Comments
For years, I’ve heard people complain about how much work a pool is, and they’re right – it is a lot of work. But there’s nothing like diving into the deep end on a hot Florida summer night and staring at the moon while you float on your back.
Algae has been an issue this summer – powdery clouds of yellow that tinge the water green when you brush the floor and walls. I’ve learned to spot developing algae long before it blooms, my keen eyes able to distinguish even the slightest deviation from blue.
The cure is chlorine. However, in order for it to work, the water has to be balanced chemically in other areas, like pH. It’s a process to make algae disappear. First you need to make sure the water composition is stable enough to hold the chlorine. Then you have to remove the algae with a brush, clean the filter, add more chemicals, brush again, and clean the filter one more time. Sometimes it takes several rounds of this process to be rid of it.
It’s taken three days to kill off this last batch of algae. Process, process, process. The water is still slightly cloudy, but at least it’s blue again. One thing I do know is that constantly checking on it and spending energy wondering when it will be crystal clear again does not help the process.
All I need to do is do what I know I need to do and let it go. Not fret over it. Not inspect every square inch for signs of a re-occurrence. Not wonder how long it will take to get back to blue. It’s simple really. Right?
I started wondering what else in my life I treat like the pool. Where am I fretting, inspecting, wondering? I’m happy to report it’s a short list, but it wasn’t always that way. I spent years trying to “help” the process. And you know what I discovered? The process doesn’t care about me . . . at all.
So now, when something is out of alignment, I take the steps necessary to return to peace and trust that as long as I’ve done what I can do, the process will take care of itself. I move on to the next thing and let what is be. Now if I could just figure out how to do that with the pool.
Tags: course in miracles, ego, insight, peace, process, self-improvement, spirituality, yoga
Fri, August 14 2009 » Thoughts » 5 Comments
Peacefully unconscious in a blissful sleep, I was yanked violently awake by the sound of helicopters circling overhead. It seemed as if they would descend through the roof at any moment – engines gunning, blades whirling. Exhausted, I tried to ignore them but found it impossible. It was 3:15 am by the time I heard them move on to the next quadrant of their search. And by then, the irrationality that is born from being startled awake had blossomed into a Venus Flytrap.
I knew they were police helicopters and I lay in bed, fighting to get back to sleep. Who are they looking for? What had he done? What if he’s hiding in my back yard? These questions bounced off the insides of my brain like popping corn, leaving tiny little marks from their hot centers that eventually melted together and created a panic. I got out of bed and paced, peeking out the windows and searching the blackness outside for shadows.
Settled in again, I experienced several rounds of breathing deeply, drifting off, hearing an unfamiliar noise, and finding myself wide awake again. This went on until about 4 when, unable to fight the physical exhaustion any longer, I finally fell asleep.
When I woke up, I felt like I’d been in a fight. I called two neighbors, neither of whom had even heard the helicopters. Then I contacted the police to find out what had happened. It turns out it was a perfect storm of man-hunting – three different helicopters, all searching within a mile of my house for three different suspects. The woman at the police aviation center was very nice and suggested I consider buying protection.
The entire morning, I operated in reverse. I wasn’t going fast enough to be in slow motion. As I prepared to leave for a meeting, the gray skies opened up making the roads slick and slowing traffic. While driving in this foggy state – both inside my head and outside in the world – I had a moment of utter clarity. Is this how it feels to live in Afghanistan or Jerusalem or Palestine?
If my one single night of sleep interrupted by helicopters overhead for a mere 45 minutes could create such a disconcerting state of mind, what must it be like to hear bombs exploding, machine guns firing, and tanks rolling every night? More importantly, where do you have to go within yourself to get used to it so that you can actually give your body some of the rest it requires to function?
Every experience is relative. And I won’t mitigate the impact that being woken out of a sound sleep by police searching for suspected criminals had on my mental and physical states. However, I realize in a different way just how fortunate I am to live in a place where it is a once in a blue moon occurrence instead of something I must find a way to make normal.
Tags: insight, peace, police, policing, process, self-improvement, spirituality, war, yoga
Thu, August 6 2009 » Insights » 3 Comments
For months now, I have received comments on this blog that I have chosen not to post. Many might perceive them as mean and hateful, but each one of them has provided the opportunity to surrender another layer of lies I’d told myself about who I was. The “buttons” they pushed were brought into the light where I was able to acknowledge they were illusions. Today I approved each and every one of those comments, which are now available for public consumption by clicking on the “comment” link underneath the blog titles. Why? Because they don’t mean anything. And I now understand that at a level I’ve never known before. So here’s some love for the “haters” – you help me to know mySelf.
Tags: course in miracles, ego, hate, insight, jealousy, love, peace, process, self-improvement, spirituality, yoga
Wed, July 29 2009 » Insights » 2 Comments