Category Archives: Spiritual Well Being

Character, Goals and Dreams, Spiritual Well Being, Uncategorized

Big Ideas to Live By

1 Comment

For the last three years or so this list has been hanging around my desk, on my bulletin board, pasted to my fridge-you get the idea. Just some key words to encourage me and keep me moving forward in anticipation:

My Apple Tree Philosophy – Just Plant It!

The Basket Philosophy – gather up the pieces that none be lost

Mom’s Taxi – Be about the business of getting people where they need to go – including yourself.

Learning is Exponential – Every bit of knowledge integrates and facilitates mastery of something seemingly unrelated.

The Apple Tree philosophy has to do with one’s tendency to say, “Maybe I shouldn’t waste time and money planting a tree, I probably won’t even be living here in 5 or 6 years when the tree bears fruit.” Just plant it!

Sometimes the experiences of ones life seem fragmented, little bits and pieces of unrelated stuff.  Gather them up, every experience is useful and has purpose.  Maybe you will end up with 12 extra baskets full of good stuff as in the miracle of Jesus feeding the multitudes.

I love my kids and I love being part of getting them where they need to go.  I’ve been doing this for over 30 years.  Most recently I realized that I also have a responsibility to get my self where I am supposed to go.

Almost daily I experience the sensation of some new bit of knowledge creating a metaphor that applies to several other areas of comprehension. May I never stop learning; never stop believing that each puzzle piece I pick up has an entire puzzle somewhere out there, and may I always have the eagerness to keep searching and thinking and learning.

co-dependence, Emotional Health, Goals and Dreams, Health and Long Life, Religion, Spiritual Well Being, The Petty Pace, Uncategorized

Voo Doo Prayers

1 Comment

Voo Doo Prayers; I hate them. I refuse them. They release way too much negative energy into the world through thoughtless, selfish, controlling words. You know what I mean. Voo Doo prayers go something like this:
Dear God, please make Jane trip and skin her knee right here so I can help her up and be her hero.
Dear God, please help Joe’s plane to have mechanical problems so it never leaves the ground because he shouldn’t be going on that trip anyway. Dear God, do something bad or scary in John Doe’s life so he will have to call on God for help and know that I have been right about God all along…….
How much better it is to pray a recovery style prayer, “Dear God, please give Jane, or Joe, or John, knowledge of your will for their lives today and give them the power to carry it out.” Oops, I forgot to ask God to keep me in the loop and tell me what his will is for Jane’s life – how will I ever know to pray heartily for that will and what I can do to make sure Jane does that will (are you smiling?).
Voo Doo prayers; I hate them, I reject them. Someone has been meddling with my car and my computer with voodoo prayers. I reject them. Onward, straight into the wave of what positive and good (tho sometimes hard) things God has for me.

Character, Emotional Health, Goals and Dreams, Spiritual Well Being, The Petty Pace

Some things……

1 Comment

Last Thursday I caught a ride with my office mate to pick up my car at the garage (new clutch-thousand bucks).  As I buckled in I attempted to put on my sunglasses and found they were missing a screw. The temple came off in my hand.  Being in somewhat of a hurry and distracted by the necessity of giving directions, I stuffed the temple in my purse and balanced my sunglasses on my nose.  This proved fruitless and I hopped out of the car at the garage clutching my purse and loose glasses.  In order to drive home in the waning sun, I wore the spare sunglasses I keep in the car.  Later I dumped my purse out and searched for the temple to no avail.  On Friday I checked the floor of my office mate’s car.  Still no temple. I was disappointed.  Sure it was just a cheap pair of fashion shades, but, they fit well and it had taken me several months to spare the $14.00 for something a little nicer than the castoffs I had been wearing.

Saturday I did some shopping for necessities of existence.  On the way home, I  chanced to drive past the garage and on a whim, I swung into the deserted parking lot.  There on the pavement was my missing temple.  I rejoiced as I returned home. I felt very blessed to find what was lost.

Later, when I took out the glasses and optical screw driver to complete the repair, I was concerned to find that the parts did not line up and slip into place.  A closer look revealed that the temple had been run over and the connecting piece bent.  I tried to pry it gently, but, my optical experience told me that the odds of righting it without ruining it were very slim.  I was sad.  “God,” I said, “You gave me back what was lost and it brought me a lot of joy, but it is useless and it is probable the only thing I can do to help will instead break it beyond repair.  What is your purpose in even giving it back?  What is going on here that I need to learn?”

Very swift came the answer:  Some things just cannot be fixed.

Will I try?  You bet!  But, I will not think less of myself if my efforts fail.  I will be at peace.

Character, co-dependence, Emotional Health, Goals and Dreams, Health and Long Life, Spiritual Well Being, The Rules

Rule Number 1:

1 Comment

 

Never, ever, make someone feel bad. Its not nice to make someone feel bad. Nice people never make someone feel bad. So if you are a child, be very careful that you never disobey your parents. If you disobey, even once, it will make your parents feel bad. Your mother will say, “Don’t you love mommy? It makes mommy feel bad when you do not obey.” If you do not obey your father he will say, “What have I done wrong that I have raised a child that does not obey.” He will feel bad. You don’t want to make anyone feel bad.

 

If you are a student at school or a worker in an office, never succeed above your peers. It makes them feel stupid if you get a better grade on a test or if you can naturally do a skill they have not yet mastered. Do not make them feel bad by being better than they are. Everyone knows it is not nice to act better than someone else. Hide your skills. You do not want others to feel bad.

 

If you are an adult in charge of others, don’t correct your underlings when they make an error, encourage them instead. If you correct them, they may feel bad and think you are not a nice person.

 

If you are a spouse, take care that you never make your mate feel bad. Instead, choose words that encourage. If you disagree, never infer that your spouse’s position is wrong. You must put things in the best light, beat around the bush, change your position if you find yourself coming dangerously close to the heart of the matter. Never ask them to do something they don’t want to do. You must not make them feel bad.

 

If you are writing or speaking to any of the general public, be sure you choose a vocabulary that is positive and uplifting whether it gets the point across or not. Otherwise someone will say, “That’s too preachy,” and you will be devastated that you almost went to press with something that would make someone feel bad. You must never, ever, make someone feel bad. Nice people just don’t do that.

 

Congratulations! You have made yourself responsible for the feelings and happiness of everyone else. You are now codependent.

Emotional Health, Goals and Dreams, Health and Long Life, Spiritual Well Being, Uncategorized

The Hundred Acre Park

Leave a comment

There is a hundred acre park near the place I live, where I love to walk. It is hallowed ground. I know it is hallowed because God speaks to me there; plays on my heartstrings with his presence, renews my mind with grand views of magnificent desert canyons; fires my brain to remember lessons long forgot; knowledge embedded in my DNA; senses long dormant. There my logic becomes untangled; hunches long denied are acknowledged, and I become ME again, the ME I am created to be.

I become balanced, centered again in the me that would rather be well than right. The me that has learned to live one day at a time in courage and trust, rather than the me that runs around unsuccessfully trying to control others in order to order my future.

I have walked many places. God is not absent from any of them. A walk is always restorative. But this, this is a place I keenly sense his presence. I like to think of the early valley farmers and ranchers – over 100 years ago, who first settled this land and farmed and later deeded, gave, or sold the land to the city.

What must they have done to this land to make it undulate so with vibes of the sacred? I picture them standing in a field, faces uplifted toward the sun, crying out, “God, thank you for this land! We hallow and dedicate this field-forever as a blessing to others-that they might feel you presence here and seek your wisdom and health through enjoyment of this great outdoors!Author, pic by Kvon