Self-Care, Healing, & Forgiveness Pt. 3

I had a busy day yesterday taking care of things at home and starting our garden, but I was also thinking about how I want to talk about forgiveness.  It used to be that I would chew on a topic before writing about it and I would sit and have enormous brain waves once 9:00 PM hit.  Somewhere along my education road that changed and now I'm writing before 8:00 AM.  This isn't an easy subject for me because, quite frankly, I'm not good at forgiveness.  It has caused me to do a lot of soul-searching the past few months.  This is a topic that is a little hard for many people because, like me, they have been under the wrong impression about forgiveness.  So, let me first talk about what forgiveness is not.  Forgiveness is not a miracle cure.  It is not a one time thing.  Forgiveness in no way excuses the bad behavior of others.

Picture found on Rebel Thriver

What is forgiveness then?  It is simply choosing to NOT allow hurtful things to continue to have a place in your soul.  Forgiveness says, "I acknowledge my worth and I know I deserve better, so I won't allow this to affect me any longer."  This statement about forgiveness can make things a little difficult because first you have to acknowledge your worth, and you have to continue acknowledging your worth on a daily basis to keep in the attitude of forgiveness.  That was a problem for me for a long time.  I felt like I didn't measure up to the rules and ideologies that were put on me by religion and religious people.  I felt like I could never do enough, therefore, I wasn't enough.  It took years to break that mindset and if I slacken at all, I will fall back into it.  I had to realize that not only was I allowing others to treat me badly and allowing them to negatively affect my soul, I was treating myself badly.

In my experience there are three types of forgiveness that we have to go through to replenish soul health.  The first is the forgiveness of others.  This is the one that most people talk about, allowing the expectations and bad behavior of others to influence our lives.  The second one is forgiveness of ourselves.  I haven't heard many people talk about this.  Many of us have self-deprecating behaviors and attitudes.  We feel like we aren't good enough for one reason or another and live in guilt and shame.  The third type of forgiveness is the forgiveness of The Other (God, Spirit).  To my recollection, I have never heard anyone talk about this type of forgiveness.  But in my experience, it can be a vital part of the healing process.  The same ceremonies and tangible things we do to open ourselves up to healing can be done to forgive others.  They provide reminders of the new life we are embracing.

Sometimes when we hold unforgiveness toward others, it comes in the guise of "I'm better than how you treated me, so I'm going to hold it against you," when in reality, at its core, unforgiveness keeps us in a trap of perpetual hurt and despair.  It seems to say the opposite of what it appears.  If we truly believed that we were valuable enough to NOT be mistreated, we wouldn't continue to harm our emotional and spiritual health by not forgiving.  It's a trap that uses confusion and lack of knowledge to ensnare us.  However, when we sincerely value ourselves, we begin to see that the only way to provide soul-health is to let go of the things that people have done to harm us.  By holding on to those things, we allow the hurt to deepen instead of heal.

We all do things that we either know we shouldn't and later regret, or realize we shouldn't have done after the fact and live in guilt.  Regardless of how we come to the knowledge of our own poor choices, the key is to allow ourselves to move on and not live in shame and guilt.  I used to live in guilt and shame because I never felt like I measured up to religious expectations.  First, I had to realize the fault wasn't with me, I had to accept myself for not being perfect and forgive myself for holding too high of expectations.  Once I realized those things, I learned to evaluate the expectations of others, and I had to forgive them for expecting me to be a model of their creation and for saying hurtful things when I didn't measure up.  Then I had to forgive myself for being almost 30-years-old and not recognizing the trap I was in.  We have to forgive ourselves for our own short-comings and poor choices because the reality is, what's done is done and none of us is perfect.  You or I cannot change the past.  We can only choose to do better with our present decisions.  And our present decisions can come from the root of forgiving ourselves so that we can be free to be the lovely individuals we are at our cores.

Thirdly, forgiveness of The Other.  For some, this is going to be a difficult concept to grasp, for others it is going to be something that they have never had to encounter.  For others still, there is no belief in The Other.  For those who need to hear this, your soul will latch on to it and you will move into it as your path is laid out for you.  All in due time.  Here is my belief and experience.  I was raised in a specific belief system, I refrain from naming it because I DO NOT want this to turn into me speaking against any specific belief system.  We each have to find our own path and each path is valid as long as love and light are at its core.  In the aforementioned system, I was taught that it is the relationship between The Other (God) and the individual that matters, but then I proceeded to receive teaching that I had to listen to "spiritual authorities" to really know what that relationship should be.  (A bit of an oxymoron, right?)  While I do not continue to claim that specific belief system, I continue to hold core values that align with it, and I also embrace core values from other belief systems (I'm eclectic that way).  I believe there are two universal truths: Love is the Light, and The Other (God, Spirit) is Love; I try to have these two things dictate my life and my spirituality.  I still believe that each of us has a relationship with The Other, but it is up to the individual what that relationship looks like.  Each of us knows our souls better than any "authority" can.  When I received the hurts and betrayal from those within my religious sphere, I also began to be angry at The Other.  For a long time I harbored bitterness against The Other because of how "his" people acted toward me.  I hadn't seen the light and love from anyone, at that moment I felt alone and in the dark and God was to blame.

Here are some things I learned about that experience.  First of all, The Other can handle your anger and bitterness.  It isn't a sin to feel emotion, to hurt.  If you're angry at The Other, express it.  Get alone (I prefer in the wilderness), and yell at the top of your lungs, or be quiet and express it in the solitude of your heart and mind, or write it.  Just, don't keep it in.  Next, you may not receive an audible answer, but the release of emotions and hurt is an answer within itself.  For me, being able to look around me and see beauty in flowers again was an answer.  Listening to birdsong and hearing its serenity was an answer.  My answer was that life goes on.  I could let go because life would continue and I am surrounded by beautiful things, I could be part of it or continue in anger and bitterness.  Your answer will be specific to you, but you have to be open to receive, you have to have truly let go of the anger and bitterness.

Finally, I had to forgive The Other.  Here's the thing, as an infinite energy/being above our finite understanding, The Other doesn't need our forgiveness.  But, WE need to forgive.  If for any other reason to be able to look around and receive the beautiful things in life.  Regardless of what beauty is to you, you have to make room for it.  For me, nature is beautiful, goodness and kindness are beautiful, life at its center is beautiful.  I wasn't able to receive any of these things as long as I held unforgiveness.  I would look around me and see death and destruction and negativity.  Then, I learned to forgive.  I learned to realize that The Other created me to be more and receive more than I was allowing.  When I opened myself up to the fact that unforgiveness only harmed myself and that in many cases I had to choose to forgive every...single...day...I began to feel the connection again with the Other that fuels my existence.

Life isn't easy.  Everyone has hardships.  Everyone has hurt and pain.  The only person any of us has any power over, the only life we can dictate, is our own.  If we choose the things that are lovely and beautiful, the things that spread light and love within ourselves, our lives reflect that.  Life won't be easier, but we will be healthier in our souls.  Forgiveness is hard, but life is better when we embrace it.  I am going to provide some links below to share some books that have helped me in my journey.

Light and Love.

In no particular order:
The Shack by Wm. Paul Young
To Walk a Pagan Path by Alaric Albertsson
Standing in the Light: My Life as a Pantheist by Sharman Apt Russell
Mahabharata retold by William Buck
Captivating: Unveiling the Mystery of the Woman's Soul by John and Stasi Eldredge
The Teaching of Buddha by Bukkyo Dendo Kyokai

Self-Care, Healing, and Forgiveness Pt. 2

I'm writing this blog in the mid afternoon, sipping some Tiesta tea, Energizer blend.  I received a box yesterday from a friend (let's talk about care packages as promoting self-care!) that included all types of lovely things, the above linked tea was included.  Teas are among my favorites for self-care.

Hot tea is good for the soul!

Another part of self-care is to open ourselves up to healing.  I'm not speaking about physical healing, (although tea is good for that too!) I am referring to emotional healing.  I think this type of healing is perhaps the most difficult to go through.  Many times the only way we can sufficiently heal is to seek profession help.  Other times we can take small steps on our own to work through hurts.

As I was thinking about what, exactly, I would write about in regards to emotional healing, I was confronted by some things within myself that I need to heal from.  It is hard to be open to healing because we often use our hurts like a blanket, holding on tightly in hopes to protect ourselves from further harm.  The only thing is, this particular blanket is ugly, coarse, and will never cover us sufficiently enough.  Forgiveness is one way to move toward healing, I will talk about that in my next post, but there is more.

I think that my favorite way of moving past hurts is to do symbolic rituals of "letting go".   (Cue Frozen theme song!) This isn't an act of forgiveness, it is an act of acknowledging your hurt.  The most simple way to do this is to write out, "I feel hurt because..." Fill in the rest, focusing on the hurt.  For example, "I feel hurt because I want to be noticed for my work instead of being looked over by my boss."  No other explanation is needed.  Just acknowledge your hurt, acknowledge the reason for it, take that piece of paper, and burn it as a symbol of freeing yourself from that hurt.  Please understand that by releasing the hurt, you are NOT under any circumstances excusing bad behavior on the part of another.  Choosing to "be above such things" is solely for your own health, and acknowledging our emotions is a very healthy practice.  Male or female, you have emotions.  The way you feel about any given thing is a natural response to a stressor.  NEVER feel ashamed for your emotions, and NEVER beat yourself up over them.  The way you feel is valid.  Acknowledge your validity, and acknowledge your emotions, then release them.  When we release our own hurt, we can in turn find compassion and kindness towards others.  I know that when I am holding on to some hurtful things, I tend to become negative and bitter.  My negativity and bitterness helps me to feel more "thick-skinned" when in reality it is only hurting me more.  It is a vicious cycle.  Releasing the hurt that we have received helps us to become more balanced, understanding, and lovely individuals. It allows us to grow into who we are at our core instead of who society and others dictate we should be.  When we partake in a symbolic act of releasing hurt, it helps to give us something tangible to hold on to as a remembrance that we are no longer allowing emotional pain to dictate who we are.  You can use something from your ritual that will remind you of what you've done.  I like pocket rocks.  You can use a crystal or any other rock and keep it with you as a symbol of positive emotions.  Or pick a flower and press it in a journal as a symbol of the new life you are embracing.  Whatever it is, it should serve in remembrance of letting go.  Now you can continue to practice letting go every time that hurt tries to seep back into your soul.

Picture found on She Who Is

On March 20th there is a new moon, solar eclipse, and the vernal equinox.  This is a good time to practice healing and releasing rituals.  You can incorporate it into any type of belief system you have. There is no specific prayer to pray that works better than any other, and if you don't believe in prayer, you can believe in symbolism.  I will have my husband build the fire in the fire ring in the yard instead of on the patio.  I'm going to write down some things that have hurt me, acknowledge my feelings, the hurt, and then I'm going to choose to let it go by burning the papers under the new moon.  With the vernal equinox, I will accept new life and beauty into my sphere and try to focus on the positive things, the non-hurtful, that surround me.  I will also journal, not about the hurt, but about my ceremony, my letting go and what new and positive things I expect.  Spring is a perfect time for this because it is the time of year when we see new life, new beauty emerging from the depths of the cold harshness of winter.   (Here is a link to other moon rituals).  There is a silent grace and beauty about the moon.  She brings me peace and acceptance when I struggle to find some.  May you find your path to healing and continue to grow into the beautiful individual you are at your core.

Light and Love.

Self-Care, Healing, & Forgiveness Pt. 1

mmmm...Coffee

I have the kettle on for my second cuppa joe and I'm mentally bemoaning the time change. Every time Spring comes around and we have to spring forward, I am reminded that time change works directly against taking care of ourselves. For those of us who try to become more balanced and aligned with the natural rhythms of nature, the illogical, human-mandated change of time wreaks havoc in our systems. How are we supposed to live in harmony with ourselves, nature, AND societal standards and edicts? I mean, we can't ALL move to Arizona and live it up in a non-time-changing zone.   ;)

This is to say that self-care has been pushing its way to the front of my mind. A big part of self-care has to do with eating habits, exercise, and spirituality. I already touched on exercise and spirituality, although I might do so again. But, I haven't talked about eating habits. I might do that at a later post, but that topic has become so prevalent that, quite honestly, I don't want to become part of the debate.  I believe in a few basic rules when it comes to the foods we consume.  Number one: Try to eat organic foods, or the closest thing to it (chemicals and hormones are bad).  Number two: listen to your body.  If you eat something and you feel icky afterward (gas, stomach/intestinal pain, headaches, etc.), try eliminating it.  Number three: If you cook it yourself, it is more likely to be healthy.   I may do one post about my various trials and tribulations with what I've done with my eating habits, but not today.  Today I am going to touch on self-care.  I did a presentation on this in one of my graduate counseling classes, but since then, my understanding and passion has grown.  I am a huge proponent of taking care of ourselves.  Each of us has to, at some point, become a little selfish.  We each have to think about our own well being.  Even the kindest, most giving individual will begin to feel horrible physically, emotionally, and spiritually if he or she doesn't take care of him or herself.

With time change, one of the best ways to combat imbalance is to try to go to sleep earlier.  Ideally, this would be an hour earlier, but starting with 15-30 minutes is still a good idea.  Maybe you can allow yourself to go to bed 15-30 minutes early and wake up 15-30 minutes late.  That way you aren't throwing yourself off by too much.  I know that our bodies will eventually reset themselves and we will grow accustomed to the time, but I love to find ways to help my body NOT suffer. Here are some things we do every night to help us sleep.  My husband is on medication for insomnia associated with nightmares because of PTSD.  Even with his medication, he can wake up at night and have a difficult time getting back to sleep right away.  His doctor recommended using white noise as a way to lull him to sleep.  We started off with using a fan, but graduated to nature sounds using Sleep Pillow on the iPad.  (Here is a website that lists sleep apps for Android).  We found that when we go camping, husband sleeps better.   With that realization, we decided to create our own mix of his favorite nature sounds.  He likes wind, crickets, and rain.  I've found that now I can't sleep without it.  I have a problem sleeping sometimes for two reasons, my mind won't shut down and sinus issues.  When I need my mind to quiet, I make a cup of a blend of sleep-aid tea I've created (one day I will be able to offer this tea for sale) and I either sit in the dark until I'm falling asleep and have finished my tea, or I sit in bed and read a "bedside" book.  The books I read in bed aren't spellbinding.  Usually they have to deal with spirituality.  (My bedside list right now consists of: Women Who Run with the Wolves, Gaia Speaks, A Calendar of Wisdom, and Standing in the Light). If I have things going through my mind that won't leave, I journal my thoughts and do a grounding exercise similar to the ones I described in my last post.  I am still researching the best natural ways to deal with my sinuses.  For a long time I took Claritin-D.  I couldn't sleep without it, but then i started having dizzy spells and vertigo feelings.  I quit taking the medication and it went away.  Now I'm using this organic breathe easy rub from Honest.com.  I rub it on the bottom of my feet, chest, and nose.  I also use doTerra lavender and peppermint essential oils.  I massage them into the base of my skull, temples, and eyebrows.

The last one I made

So, what if you go to sleep early and still feel like you are way too drained the next day?  Grafanaki and colleagues (2005) describe "leisure" as being a way to help us de-stress.  Leisure is defined as, "the ability to experience timelessness, letting go of the need for structure and boundaries, a melding of the sacred and secular" (Grafanaki et al., 2005, p. 31).  Roland (2009) expounds on leisure, "Find what helps, embrace a stress-free zone now and then (whatever that is for you), and then allow the time and attention to use that help" (p. 66).  Leisure and stress-free zones differ from one to another.  For one, it might be exercise, for another it may be reading or watching a movie.  Whatever it is, take time out to do it.  My mom is a business woman, oversees several different bank branches, often requiring a lot of travel.  Her way of decompressing after work is to play games on her phone or kindle, games like Candy Crush.  They help distract her mind from work and allow her to relax physically.  For me, I enjoy making things.  I recently started a new crochet rag rug, this one will be rectangular.  I also enjoy listening to books, they help me escape mentally.

So, ways of taking care of yourself include: eating healthy, making time for exercise (and spending time outdoors), pay attention to your soul-health,  sleep well, and schedule leisure.  Finally, be open to emotional healing by practicing forgiveness.  In my next post (or two), I will go more in depth about healing and forgiveness.  For now, focus on your sleep, your body needs it, your brain needs it, your spirit needs it.  Focus on your leisure time; do things you love, even if it is for five minutes.  Focus on what your body naturally wants for nutrition (not addictions like sugar!), and happy health to you all!  If you have something specific that works for you in taking care of yourself, share it in the comments.

Light and Love!

References
Grafanaki, pearson, Cini, Godula, McKenzie, Nason, & Anderegg. (2005). Sources of renewal: A qualitative study on the experience and role of leisure in the life of counselors and psychologists, Counseling Psychology Quarterly, 18(1), 31-40.

Roland, Catherine B. (2009). Wellness: A review of theory and measurement for counselors, Journal of Counseling & Development, 87, 216-226.

Walking Spirituality

There are two things that are close to my heart right now.  Walking and Spirituality.  The two have become intertwined for me.  A large part of that is because a friend gave me a book called Walking Meditation by Nguyen Anh-Huong and Thich Nhat Hanh.  Another reason why walking and spirituality are woven together for me is because I have witnessed healing to my husband's heart and soul with his nature walks.  He found a connection to The Other (God, Spirit) that I soon started to admire and desire for myself.

I have always enjoyed going for walks, and hit a peak a few years back when I went for a 2-mile walk everyday before any daily obligations or activities.  I found a nice path where I could be safe and enjoy the scenery and the antics of my dog tugging at his leash to chase ground squirrels.  When my husband and I married and moved out of my hometown, I lost my path (physically and spiritually) and had a difficult time finding one I was comfortable with in both aspects.  Also, it seemed like every time I started to walk, my body would rebel.  I have bursitis in both of my knees and the hills had a negative effect on them, and not walking caused me to become a more negative person.  Finally, my husband came home with a brilliant idea.  Every day he goes out past an abandoned fort.  He suggested that I walk around the fort.  I started a little over a week ago to walk around the fort on a daily basis.  I have noticed not only more energy and an overall more positive feeling, but I've begun to feel that connection I so admired.

"Peace is every step.

An overcast early Spring day on the abandoned Fort

The shining red sun is my heart.
Each flower smiles with me.
How green, how fresh all that grows.
How cool the wind blows.
Peace is every step.
It turns the endless path to joy."
~Tinh Thuy
(as quoted in Walking Meditation, 2006, p. 1)


Research has shown that being outdoors has significant health benefits.  TIME Magazine recently published an article that speaks about this.  Among the reasons for spending time outdoors is healing and mood improvement.  Mother Nature Network published an article about the benefits of walking.  Sunlight helps our bodies to regulate.  There is a growing belief in the mind-body-spirit connection.  I am one of those who believe in this connection.  I also believe that we have a connection with the world around us.  When we are in a stress-filled work environment, we generally become stressed and unhealthy.  When we are in a tranquil natural environment, we generally become tranquil and healthier.

We can work to boost this effect in our lives by being mindful of the environment around us.  If you are at work, put up a picture of a nature scene that will bring your mind to a relaxed state.  Become aware of your breathing and posture.  In a counseling class I learned a basic grounding technique that can help us to become aware of our breath and posture.  Sit in your chair with your feet flat on the ground and hands rested on your lap.  Sit up straight and close your eyes.  Slowly begin to focus your attention on the various parts of your body, starting at your feet.  Feel the connection to the floor, relax your ankles, flexing and rotating them.  Continue to move up your legs, into your torso, arms, and neck, flexing and rotating your joints.  All the while, breathe deeply.  When you get to your neck, finish with envisioning that tranquil nature scene that you love, open yourself up to that tranquility, accept it as your own.   In one of my Social Work internships, I learned another grounding technique that involves nature.  It is similar; stand with one hand on a tree, the other on your heart.  Become mindful of your heart beat and your connection to the ground, your connection to the tree.  Concentrate on it, be silent, and breathe deeply, be conscious of nature around you, the sounds and smells.  When we do small things like this to take a break from the hubbub, we are taking an active part in becoming healthier, less stressed.

Spirituality.  I recently read an article on the Mother Nature Network website about spirituality in nature.  A rabbi in Colorado started conducting ceremonies and sabbath meetings outside.  In the end of the article she is quoted as saying, “You sit quietly at an overlook or beside a Ponderosa pine, and it’s easy to experience a connection to something greater than yourself" (as quoted by MNN, 2007).  When we become open to The Other, all the things that we deal with on a day-to-day basis becomes a lot smaller.  Whether your belief is in a specific deity or an energy that moves in and through all of nature, there is Something Other than ourselves at work.  What is your favorite aspect of nature?  The caress of the breeze on your skin or tickling through your hair?  Is it the first flower of Spring or the vibrant Autumn colors?  Maybe all you desire is a chair on a beach in the sunshine, looking out at the blue sea.  Whatever it is, stop and observe, first as yourself being part of nature around you, then as yourself being separate, acknowledge that we are all connected, acknowledge that you are a vital part of all of nature. Acknowledge that all around you, life continues as the most beautiful aspect of being.

I am getting ready to go on my daily walk.  I like to watch the birds flirt with one another through song and flight.  I like to notice the holes where the gophers are creating their habitats and the new buds on the trees that promise warmer weather.  I like a specific tree, a soaring pine in the middle of the courtyard with enormous sap-covered pinecones.  She is the one that I stop at to do grounding exercises.  I like to thank her for her part in the circle of life, for allowing me to take a pinecone, for being a symbol of strength and stability.  It is this little action, coupled with a walk in nature, that

The enormous pinecone.  

brings me peace.  I feel the connection with The Other and know that all is well, at the heart of it all, everything will work out.

Light & Love

Hiatus & Vision

Has it really been almost two full years since I last sat down to blog?  What in the world have I been doing for those two years?  Well, I finished school.  Finally.  I now have my Master of Arts in Interdisciplinary Studies with a focus in Counseling and Social Work.  (Whew!  It was as exhausting as it sounds!)

President Shepherd handing me my award (WNMU)

Going to school is hard but, by far, the hardest thing is figuring life out after school.  At my graduation in December 2014, I realized that I had been in school for nearly seven years.  It has been 2 months since graduation and I have yet to experience that "light bulb sensation" as to what to do to get my vision going.  I've done some research, signed up for Adsense on my blog, and have an idea about the website I want to create, but I have no idea how to get started.  Such is life after graduation.    "What now?" pervades my thinking.

So, here is my vision.  I would like to "upgrade" my blog (which means being more diligent) by making it a glorified advice column (for lack of a better way to put it).  I do not want to offer counseling, but information.  I can research and provide information about all types of things.  I have a passion about living naturally and am working on helping my family to become self-sustainable.  I would like to offer information about that same thing to others, but on a different level than other blogs.  I want people to go out and be educated about the medications they are putting in their bodies and know that there are natural alternatives to many of them, or lifestyle and diet changes that can be made to help facilitate better health.  I desire to offer products that I have designed to help with this (such as teas, candles for aromatherapy, etc) and a variety of other fun and interesting products and ideas. I also want to be able to help people find the resources they need to move ahead into the lives they envision.  When I spoke to a former professor he used the term "Wellness Coach" to describe what I want to do.  So, I want to be a Wellness Coach, but with more experience and knowledge (more means the amount of education I have received and the experiences I have had in the process of obtaining my degrees).

Bill Evans Lake

I'm not sure how to get started though.  So, I am going to start by being more diligent about my blog and sharing information that I have researched over the years in school.  Maybe then I'll have a lightbulb moment and figure this out.  Maybe if I go back to the lake I'll feel some inspiration.  It's lovely!

Light and Love!

Ignorance is Bliss

Sometimes, I think "Ignorance is bliss" is an okay thing to accept.  As humans, I have noticed, we run in one of two ways.  In one way, we are content to sit in our little bubbles and never truly strive to look at things that are outside.  We are content to believe what we are told is truth.  We become sheep, our only answer becoming an agreeing "baa".  In the other way, we see truth in such a broad way that everything is believed.  We become news mongers, watching every station with every report.  We get to where we really have no opinion that we can share because we have flown around like vultures tasting of bits of decay.  All we know is death and dying, destruction and trauma.  All this knowledge hasn't brought us to reality, but to the cold, hard fact that those things that attract us are an image of what we have become internally.

Let me go into the woods and live a solitary life like Thoreau!  Not to escape entirely and become one that lives within a bubble, but to be surrounded by beauty and the natural way of things.  

Socrates, the great Socrates, said, "True wisdom comes to each of us when we realize how little we understand about life, ourselves, and the world around us."

I believe there must be balance in all things.  One thing we all become unbalanced in is knowledge.  We have two extremes, too much or too little.  My focus lately is on love and light.  I know we live in a dark world.  I know we as humans have allowed ourselves to become dulled by the darkness.  I also know that we can choose to step into the light.  So what if we don't know about every dark thing that darkens our doorstep.  We will become truly wise when we become okay with  accepting that sometimes ignorance is bliss.  I look at the news to know what people are talking about and so I can carry on a conversation should one arise.  Then I shut it off.  A dear friend posted a link about people during hard-dark times.  This link focused on the fact that people seem to come out of the woodwork to help when tragedy strikes.  This is light.  Let's shift our focus to the beautiful things in life and accept the things we do not know.  Let us choose balance in knowledge and allow our love and light to encourage the lives of others to become lovely and light-filled.  Allow the ripples to move through every belief system, every culture, and every ethnicity.  Love and light cannot be bound by the doctrines of man if stand together.  Love and light knows no bounds if we step out of our bubbles and acknowledge the darkness, but refuse to give in to it.  If we choose to pop the enclosing bubble that we think protects us and embrace the light and love of others, our eyes will become opened.  We will be able to let go of fear and hatred.  If we choose not to be like sheep and vultures but become okay with being...song birds, who know a little of our world, partake in it with us, bask in the morning light, and sing love songs to one another, then we can become small blessings that will move to fill this world more beauty.

"...Whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things." -Philippians 4:8

Light and Love and Beauty be with you all.

Nighttime Ponderings

So, I can't sleep.  I was falling asleep when I was soaking in the candlelit bubble bath.  Once I got to bed, my mind came alive.  What is this unique individual's mind pondering at 10:24pm?  Psychoeducational Handouts.  You read that right (or perhaps stumbled a little).  What are psychoeducational handouts?

I am working on my Masters in Counseling.  I have two classes this semester with the same professor who asks us to create these (if we want to) for an "easy money" grade.  psychoeducational handouts are tools used by counselors to help clients think in a way that could be difficult and even harmful if done incorrectly and insensitively.  Last semester for my Ethics class I made a therapeutic metaphor to use with children.  This semester I have "Grief, Loss, & Trauma (GLT)" and "Child and Adolescent Development and Counseling (CADC)"  as the two classes I'm choosing to do this assignment for.  My late night brain decided that it wanted to be creative and come up with some BRILLIANT psychoeducational handouts.

For GLT I decided to do something that could help either a child or an adult deal with grief from the death of a loved one.  I haven't put mine together yet, but here is my idea.  I decided to focus on my grandfather.  First, I will introduce him to my class as I would if he were alive.  I would then relate my first memory of him and some of the little things that endeared him to me.  I haven't wracked my brain long enough to come up with my first memory, but I will share things like how he folded his cloth and how particular he was when he dusted the furniture, watching him make cinnamon rolls, visiting the ranch where he was known as "Wishbone Wally", the cook, helping him make tortillas in the kitchen with the avocado green refrigerator and matching stove.  I remember when his favorite radio station came on and he was trying to teach me how to dance, I was 12.  The conversation we had about faith when Mother Teresa died.  I will share the one regret I have, not saying I love you enough, or spending enough time with him during Christmas vacation of 1998.  I will share how Husband took me to his (and nana's) graves so he could "meet" them and thank them for their impact in my life.  I will share the time I went to his grave to sit in the grass and talk to him as if he were here to listen to me today and how a butterfly came and landed next to me at the exact moment I was wishing he were listening.  For the next step in this assignment I will share something that I plan to do every year to remember the impact he had on my life, an impact so great that almost 14 years later he is still number one on the top of my "Heroes" list.  I can't think of anything honorable enough as of yet, but it has to be more than observing a birthday.

As I lay in bed thinking about all this, I felt healing come to my heart, as I need every so often when thinking of the loss.  I realized that remembering all my positive memories and sharing them with others is one way that I have dealt with my grief over and over again.  Thinking of him made me think of other (less important) things that inspire me.  This led to the creation of my psychoeducational handout for CADC.

For this one, I am going to use my own "inspiration" version of Bronfenbrenner's bioecological systems theory chart.  Instead of listen regular things that go in each category I am going to focus only on things that inspire me.  In the macrosystem you'll find people like Gandhi, MLK Jr., Buddhism, Hinduism, philosophers, Jesus, etc.  In the exosystem I am going to list other things/people that inspire me, and so on, down to my individual self.  The thing that will make this unique, is that I am going to make it a collage.  It will have pictures of family and friends, I'll cut out things from magazines that inspire me, like nature, butterflies, books, music, and what-not.

When I was first going to bed my mind was overwhelmed with negativity.  I couldn't sleep, and allowed my mind to drift.  These exercises, thinking of all the positive things that make me focus on why I live, why I love life, and why I choose to do what I do, gave me peace.  If this budding counselor can find peace in things like this, maybe others can too.  Maybe you can use my ideas to help you find peace in the midst of loss and grief.  Maybe you need a reminder as to why life is beautiful.  Take a moment and think of the things that inspire you.  Think of all the beautiful memories of the one you lost and relish in those moments of happiness and lock them away in your heart, stuffing out negativity.  May all that is good and beautiful in this world suddenly hit you and give you new reason to be alive.  May you realize how amazing and beautiful you are.