LIFE LESSONS that WE KEEP on LEARNING

Over the weekend, I was thinking that there are so many great lessons from life. I made a list  of the most important ones so far, for me.  These “lessons”  have had a great impact in my life thus far.  Read On!

1. We get treated in life the way we teach others to treat us.

You have no idea how true this is. It was us who allowed THEM at one point to start treating us the way they do and little by little we got into the mess we are right now, having to live with the consequences. Respect and love yourself and others will do the same.

2. There are no mistakes, only lessons we need to master.

The idea is for us to learn from everything and everyone, of course, if you want to, and if you don’t, well, your life will look at 40 the same way it did when you were 20 and at 60 the way it looked when you were 40, and so on.

3. Forgiveness is a gift you give to yourself.

 A lot of people think that the moment they decide to forgive somebody who once hurt them, the person who receives the forgiveness is the only one who will benefit from this kind gesture, but that’s not the case. I can tell you that the person who will benefit the most is the person who does the forgiving. Holding onto anger and resentment can do you no good; it’s like having a clenched fist 24/7.

4. What you resist persists… and what you focus on… expands.

We’re resisting change, we’re resisting our problems, resisting the weather, resisting our friends and family, resisting our responsibilities, our job, our boss… our lives. There are so many things we are resisting, not realizing that resistance will only make things worse. Carl Jung talks about this, warning us that what we resist not only will persist but will also grow in size.

5. Life is all about the journey and less about the destination.

 A lot of times we get so caught up in what we want to achieve, that perfect picture, that end result, that we forget to live and to really enjoy this journey called life. Now,you may want to take a deep cleansing breath, and allow yourself to be present in everything you do. Allow yourself to enjoy each second of your life; to observe the world around you; to observe the people that are present in your life and the beauty that is present within you and all around you, life in general.

6. People deserve a second chance.

The moment you forgive somebody, chances are that you will also give them a second chance, a chance to be near you, without trying to remind them of what they did to you, treating them not as they are, or as they once were, but rather as you want them to be. By doing this, you are also allowing them to grow and to become better and better every day. Your ego might tell you to “let these people go” but what does your heart tell you? We are all humans, we all make mistakes, and we all deserve a second chance.

7. If you don’t believe in yourself, nobody else will.

Don’t expect others to see gold where you can only see dust. If you don’t believe in yourself, if you don’t believe that you are a capable, a worthy human being, chances are that nobody will. You will act on that belief and people will treat you based on what you think about yourself, based on how you treat yourself and based on how you act and behave in the world.

8. Our attitude toward life will determine life’s attitude toward us.

If you think life is unfair, that bad things always happen to you, chances are that life will treat you unfairly, and you will always have many reasons to complain about. On the other hand, if you think life is a gift, a gift for you to enjoy, not to keep, that wonderful things always happen to you, that wonderful people are being drawn to you, life will give you all of those things and even more. Just how there is a law of gravity, there is also a law of attraction, and based on this law, you attract in your life that which you think about all day long, you attract that which you are, because you see, like attracts like.

9. If you love yourself, chances are  others will love you also.

It’s all about self love, it all starts with self love. If you don’t have love for yourself, how can you expect to get it from somebody else? Love yourself and others will love you also.

10. The world has plenty of information but not enough inspiration.

If you think about it, now with the technological revolution, we get access to so much information. Let’s take for example a tiny chip. How much information can you store on it? Isn’t it incredible? We have more information than ever… but when it comes to inspiration (in- spirit) I would say that we have a deficit. We focus too much on the outside and not enough on the inside. We can’t seem to understand that it all starts from within. If the inside is a mess, the outside will also be a mess. Listen to your heart, listen to your intuition and know that: “The only real valuable thing is intuition.” Albert Einstein

11. The world won’t change if you don’t change.

You hear people all the time complaining about how crazy the world is and how they want it to change, but if you tell them to make the first step…: “What? Me? Do you think there is something wrong with me? I am perfect, there is nothing I need to change. These people are crazy and they need to change, not me! They are the ones who are destroying us all, not me… Those bastards!” 

You see,the outside world is a reflection of who we all are on the inside, and all this madness that is taking place around us, is a result of our collective consciousness, and unfortunately it’s a very polluted consciousness. It’s not just them, it’s us, us all. If we want the world to change, we have to start with ourselves, and trust me, there is something wrong with many of us. With you, with me, with he and she…

12. Loneliness is different from solitude.

There is a difference between being lonely and being in solitude. When you are in solitude, you take advantage of it to get in touch with you inner self, to meditate and to quiet your mind, and that constant need to be around others in order for you to no longer feel lonely, will disappear. Wayne Dyer talk about this in such a wonderful way, saying that we can never be lonely if we like the person we’re alone with. If you like yourself, if you have no problem with your own person, if you have accepted yourself completely, you will be content with having some quiet time, away from all the noise. You will feel happy when alone and also when surrounded by other people.

13. The more we express our gratitude, the more things we will have to be grateful for.

The law of attraction works in all that is good and also in all that is bad, and it’s only up to us whether we choose to focus our attention on the negative or on the positive. Focus your attention on the many great things you have and you are grateful for, and you will see that the more you do that, the more reasons you will have to express your gratitude for.

14. Patience is a virtue.

In order for things to happen, in order for anything to happen, we need to be patient. We first plant the seed of greatness and then we wait for it to grow, we allow it to grow; we take care of it and we protect it. Great things take time and we need to learn how to give time, time.

15. Courage is not the absence of fear.

Fear, that crazy fear who won’t allow us to move forward, who won’t allow us to grow and transform our lives and of those around us will always be present in our lives. Even though many of us know that fear does not exist and that fear is only in our mind, we choose to be paralyzed by it and we choose to allow it to control our lives, our dreams, our goals and the level of our happiness.  Fear will be present whenever you want to stretch, whenever you want to get out of your comfort zone and whenever you want to do more, be more, have more. What we need to do is look beyond it,  and always be aware of the fact that most of the things we fear never happen, because FEAR is  nothing more than… False Expectation… Appearing Real.

The Gift of Choice.

Within all of us is the same personal attribute; it was given to each of us at birth… it is the gift of Choice. You don’t have to leave the house or go “on line” to acquire it. It is a gift we give ourselves, but often we are afraid to unwrap it.  Often, it lies unused and unopened. Today, is the day to choose a better life for yourself. 

If there is any dysfunction within your immediate living situation… be it with yourself or a loved one…it is time to remove yourself from that dysfunction.  If you are a minor, then find a trusted relative, pastor, or teacher/coach that you can talk with and give you the help you need.  If you are an adult and are being abused… in any fashion… then it is not healthy and destructive to your being. It can no longer be kept a “secret.”  In the mere admission that you “need help,”  you have made a positive choice.  If you are the one causing the dysfunction to either yourself or to others…today, it stops.  It’s a matter of choice and available to all of us…anywhere.

No more excuses, no more alibis, no more whining.  Choose a better life for yourself or a loved one.  This will be your favorite gift.  Ever.

ELIMINATING NEGATIVITY IN LIFE, FAMILY, AND THE WORKPLACE for 2017

The whole reason for any experience in our lives, is to call forth a remembrance of who we really are as an object of infinite potential. We are created as… All That Is and All That Is Not.

If we stop trying to control, move past, go beyond, cast out, go above, or run from the possibilities of “negative’ experiences” … then there is no reason for them to control us anymore.  It’s usually the negative experiences that we dwell on the most.

In other words, the instant we realize and accept that everything in our life is equal, then we recognize that we cannot go beyond or move past negative situations. They are part of our life!        I have to work really hard at this. The negative situations are equal to us, since we are infinitely everything.  However, if we let it, that’s an empowering thought.

Hence, we need to become accepting to just let go, (OR, “Let Go; Let God),  as many believe and allow the idea that the possibility of a “negative’ situation” has the potential to happen at anytime! You can become perfectly content with that idea, since you soon realize that every “negative”  situation is created, even sometimes by ourselves, and allows us to grow! Now, that idea I really like.

Magicians often use mirrors to perform their illusions because mirrors reflect a clear image of life making the illusion seem very real; you are unaware of the mirror that the magician is using. When you are the “magician” in real life situations… then there are no illusions…  you see the mirror and you use the mirror as a tool. I like to think it’s the mirror to our soul.

Think of reality as a mirror, then we must change ourselves in order to see the change in the mirror.  For example, if you desire for your hair to change color or style… then you must dye, comb or brush the hair on your head in order to see the change in the mirror. More times than not, people will try to change what they see by changing the mirrored reflection. A famous quote says, “Be the change you want to see in the world” this is exactly what that quote means. When you take responsibility for all of your reality, then you give yourself the power to change anything within your reality. Cool, huh?

We can adopt this perspective into reality, by first looking around at everything we see and hear in our reality right now. Next, close your eyes. When you close your eyes in the moment, you are telling your mind to refresh your viewpoint. Now, open your eyes and look around you again, except this time see everything as if we are looking into a mirror. Everything you are now seeing or hearing is a reflection of the mirror within you.

Everything starts from within and is reflected outwardly. If we don’t like what we see… in any aspect of our life… the reality and negative situation is ours to alter. I’m a believer!

Life is Good!

     Today, I challenge everyone to look not at the negatives of their individual lives, but rather focus on a positive.

It is virtually impossible not to find one good thing in even the most challenging of situations.   I keep thinking about a Saint Jude Children’s Research Hospital radio telethon on a local station, last year.  It was impossible not to detect  thankfulness in parents’ voices for the care their child had received while at St. Jude.   For those who do not know, this is a hospital that treats children with life threatening diseases and never, I repeat NEVER, turns away a child whose family is unable to afford the cost of the treatment.  It is one of my personal favorite organizations for many reasons.  But what hit me particularly hard was a parent, on air, who was saying that each and everytime they bring their young daughter there for Chemotherapy, when the treatment is over… she wants to stay and play… “because they are so nice there.”    The child may or may not survive her ordeal, but both she and the parents seem to get that there is always a positive in even the toughest of circumstances. I admire them.

Look at your own life.  Find the celebration.    Sue

Don’t like your present life? You have the God-given ability to change it. Now, that’s a gift we all have been given.

CHANGE your present life!

Now this is interesting. While we can’t change the past or predict the future, we can change the present life we are living. We have the choice, every single day, to do what we’re doing.

I would love to sit here and tell you that I’m writing from home because I was so inspired that I quit my “other” job to pursue my dream of being a full-time fiction writer. I would love to say that I’m going to edit all of the negativity out of my life once and for all… and live happily ever after for the rest  of my life.   Of course, it’s not that easy. There are real life issues when it comes to living the present.  Personal issues, family issues and… well, life itself crowds the every day agenda.   If we could all just do what we wanted to do every day, it would be nice, but that’s not realistic.

This brings us to a logical question: What can you take out of your present to make your life more of what you want it to be? Believe it or not, there are things you can change to make your world more of what you want it to be. Too often we settle for things as they are, assuming that is how they have to be. They don’t. You have the God-given ability to cut things out : negative people, bad places, unhealthy activities and habits, and whatever it takes in order to improve your current life’s story. Just as when you’re editing the written word,  it’s not easy to cut things out, but it can be accomplished.

This is what we need to do in real life though… edit. When you’re writing your life, you can’t have everything in the story or it gets cluttered and chaotic. What’s important to you? Give your own story strength of character and integrity of personal choices.  You can’t control what others do, but you can control your own actions!

The past may be gone and the future might be uncertain, but we have the power to choose our “ now.”

We alone are responsible for our own happiness!

 

BLAMING OTHERS is not the answer…

It is so easy in life to forget that we are responsible for our own success, happiness, and inner-peace. It is often easier to blame others than to own up to our personal failures.

 

 Many people I speak with have difficulty in this area. It is always someone else’s fault that they didn’t get the promotion. It is because of a difficult childhood (past or present)that they are unhappy or not accomplishing what God put them on Earth to accomplish. Or…the most powerful to overcome is a lack of inner-peace. Often, this lack consumes all energies and thought. “Why can’t I be happy?”

 

The answer is rather straight forward and so simple that it might elude us at first.We give happiness to ourselves by accepting equal amounts of credit for a job well done and at the same time, owning up to human errors in judgement and personal failure. It is not necessary to be perfect, but what is necessary is to step up to the plate and accept responsibility for our actions and place in life.

 

 If we are not happy where we are in life, who we have become, and what we are doing…we need to change…not the world around us. Be pro-active in these areas and success, happiness, and inner-peace will follow.

 

sue

The Winning is in the Giving!

I LIKE TO GIVE. Giving of myself in any fashion makes me feel good and the recipient(s) benefit too. It is a win:win situation for all. I’m not a saint, I do know that, but rather I see it more like a technique that I’ve learned over the years to help myself heal from my own hurtful past. Then, it just became a really good habit that I’ve continued for many years. We don’t often look at it that way. You know…”giving” as medicine, but it really is.

I know many people give in church or to a special organization in financial ways. That is truely wonderful. BUT, what I’m proposing is that we can also give in small ways each and every day and they are not always financial gifts. Sometimes, what I give is “time.” Sometimes, it’s my “help.” Sometimes, it actually is financial help…but to a total stranger. But most often, I try to be very kind to others, especially strangers, in thought, word, and deed. It is never to be thanked or liked; that’s not what this is about.

And, as anyone who knows me will tell you…I always give my advice. (I let out a loud roar as I wrote that because it is so true!) But my favorite gifts to give are gifts that noone knows about… but the “receiver.” These are RAKs (Random Acts of Kindness). Sometimes, it’s as simple as pulling someone’s garbage can back up their driveway or picking up the mis-thrown newspaper and putting it by a neighbor’s door. Perhaps, grabbing a garbage bag and collecting trash in a much used area of your neighborhood. Other times, it’s taking not only your own shopping cart back to the store, but a few others too or picking up that garment or product that’s on the store’s floor, that keeps getting either stepped on… or over.

We do these deeds not for the “thanks” that normally follows each of us doing something nice; we do them because they make the world a better place for others. However, what I guarantee is that IF you choose to be a giver, it will be you who is receiving the greatest gift. I give you my word.
Sue

St. Jude Dream Homes; Hope and a Dream

Hope, as defined in Webster’s New Collegiate Dictionary, is a desire accompanied by a specific expectation or belief in fulfillment. Hope is the trait that separates Human Beings from other mammals.

To a child, with a potentially life threatening disease, sometimes, hope is all they have.   St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, in Memphis, Tennessee was established in 1962 for the sole purpose of conducting basic and clinical research into catastrophic childhood diseases…mainly cancer… and to give its patientsboth hope and the dream of a life free from those diseases.

St. Jude, a non-sectarian hospital, treats all children without regard to race, religion, creed, or ability to pay…openly shares its findings and information with doctors and scientists around the world.  In these times of political turmoil, that is indeed refreshing knowledge.  The various treatment protocols have brought the survival rates for childhood cancers from less than twenty percent to an amazing seventy percent overall!

The basic premise appears to be as simple as children are just that…children…and are the same everywhere.  A powerful, yet basic truth that needs to be both remembered and acted upon by all of us.  At any one time, there are approximately 4,700 patients in active status, affiliated with the hospital, with most treated as outpatients.  Our investment, in children and their mental, emotional, and in this case… physical well-being is an investment in the very essence of Life itself.  It is our responsibility.

The fifty eight beds in the hospital itself are for the patients requiring hospitalization during their individual treatment.  The hospital and staff strive to provide the families with some sense of normalcy during these difficult times and so houses them in the immediate vicinity during their duration at St. Jude.  However, daily operating costs for offering these families hope and a dream of normalcy, again, is close to one million, two hundred thousand dollars each and every day. That’s where the public gets involved.

Over the past three years, eight-five percent of every dollar raised goes to the current or future needs of the hospital.  One of the ways that money is raised is by offering people across the country the opportunity to take a chance on winning a brand, new home.  In 1991, the initial St. Jude Dream Home was created by Dr. Donald Mack, a pediatric physician from Shreveport, Louisiana.  The total dollar amount raised for this home was $160,000 and at the time it seemed unbelievable. The idea took off and now seventeen years later, communities across the country embrace this event.

It doesn’t take a great deal of money to affect a change for others; it takes commitment and follow- through from all.  It takes giving back, even in times that are economically tighter.  The actual winning is the inner feeling of contentment knowing we gave someone both hope…and a dream. Give well.  That makes all the difference.

sue

CHOICE! The best gift of life.

The wonderful thing about being human is that all of us have the power of “choice.”  This applies to absolutely everything in our lives, basically from the moment we enter adulthood. Before that time we live under the dictates of adult “supervision.”    To hold another accountable for either the good and/or bad in our own lives is “crazy.”  It is also disrespectful to our Creator.  In my writings over the past two decades, I have never professed to have all the answers, but I do have a great deal of human interaction, experience, and an academic background that speaks for itself.

I share my own insight and path in hopes that it helps  others too. It has by the huge amounts of positive feedback I get at lectures, in person, and via email.  However, we all have the right to CHOOSE our own path. I have never had all the answers and never will.

Think of it!  We can choose how we live our lives and be in full control of the decisions we make each and every day.  Each sunrise we are offered a brand new opportunity to start over with our choices.  No one can make us stop being in another’s life; there must be a reason(s) and it is based on personal choice. No one can force us to eat or drink too much unless we want to; it’s our choice.  No one can make us good, productive people. It is also, our choice. 

 Likewise, no one can make us whole, happy, and a contributor to the lives of others.  We must find that path ourselves. With this gift of CHOICE comes great responsibility. It is true…no one knows what goes on in another’s life.  That goes in both directions. May we all choose the higher ground.

The Power of Positive CHOICE!

       It is virtually impossible not to find something good in even the most challenging of situations. 

      It’s difficult to see sometimes, but it’s always there. My own personal belief is that we can not control what is done to us, our individual tests and challenges by others, Nature, and our God, but we always have a choice in how we react to those tests and challenges. It appears as basic as acceptance of the things we can not change and a quiet determination to rise above our adversities as a stronger and wiser person.  It is also our opportunity to act both honorably and responsibly not only for ourselves but for others while we find our way.  Very simply, it’s Integrity or doing the right thing regardless of the outcome.  Sometimes it is difficult, but we can accomplish it. 

      Choice is what separates humans from other mammals; that’s empowering.        sue