Life Coach: Spirit, Body and Mind » reality

Shared Wisdom: A Rush of Words–Part 2

Margo — Thu, 15 Sep 2011 13:42:55 +0000

As promised in my posting on September 10th, here are some more “words of wisdom” from others. They are almost all simple one-liners – but they are not in the least bit simplistic!

“Your present circumstances don’t determine where you can go; they merely determine where you start.” (Anonymous)

“Even the rich are hungry for love, for being cared for, for being wanted, for having someone to call their own.” (Mother Teresa)

“I have long since come to believe that people never mean half of what they say, and that it is best to disregard their talk and judge only their actions.”
(Dorothy Day)

“If there is any secret to this life I live, this is it: the sound of what cannot be seen sings within everything that can, and there is nothing more to it than that.”
(Brian Andreas)

“I always treat people as if they have already reached the goal I have for them.” (Thomas Merton)

“If I am not for myself, who will be? And if I am for myself alone, then what am I? And if not now, when?” (Rabbi Hillel)

“Whether you think you can or think you can’t – you are right.” (Henry Ford)

“One day your life will flash before your eyes. Make sure it’s worth watching.” (Anonymous)

“Life is not a problem to be solved, but a reality to be experienced.” (Soren Kierkegaard)

“God always gives His best to those who leave the choice with Him.” (Jim Elliot)

So take these words of wisdom into your day today and spend some time pondering their meaning in your heart. Carry them deep into your soul and see how and if they apply to the “reality you are experiencing”!!

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Shared Wisdom: Latest Quotations

Margo — Sun, 22 May 2011 03:32:56 +0000

So while I collect my thoughts and get ready write on some specific topics that have come up for me over the past couple of months, let me share some words of wisdom from others. I think if I had lots of money I would have a house with a huge library that would house not only lots of books, but collections of all the words that I have read over the years that have impacted me deeply or influenced me in some way. Here are a few more of those precious words.

“Everything that I think, feel,say, and do belongs to me, and everything that you think, feel, say, and do belongs to you.” (Paul Ferrini)

“I cannot think myself into a new way of living; I have to live myself into a new way of thinking.” (AnShin Thomas)

“Know that making a commitment to your happiness, to your health, to your fitness, to your family, to your abundance, to your career, to your mission in life, to your love, to your friends, to your community, to your creativity, to your spiritual life, is all the same thing. It is all a commitment to growth, to wholeness, to being your best, to living life fully and gratefully starting from where you are right now!” (Jinjee)

“Making amends without forgiveness leads to dishonesty and lies.” (Anon)

“Everyone who’s human deserves to be treated with some dignity – whether they’ve done good things or bad things, they have to be given hope.”
(Elton John)

“When you stop resenting what anther person can’t give you, you begin to appreciate what they have to offer.” (Anon)

“There are some people who live in a dream world, and there are some who face reality; and then there are those who turn one into the other.”
(Douglas Everett)

“Forgiveness is the fragrance the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it.” (Mark Twain)

“The fact that Christianity is a religion of love makes every evangelizer the teller of a love story, the singer of a love song. By example as well as by words evangelizers must be teachers of love.” (from John Paul II and the New Evangelization)

“The power of a man’s virtue should not be measured by his special efforts, but by his ordinary doing.” (Blaise Pascal)

“When people envy me I think, Oh God, don’t envy me, I have my own pains.” (Barbra Streisand)

“He paints the lily of the field, perfumes each lily bell; if He so loves the little flowers, I know He loves me well.” (Maria Strauss)

“Go out into the world today and love the people you meet. Let your presence light new light in the hearts f people.” (Mother Teresa)

“He that cannot forgive others breaks the bridge over which he must pass himself; for every man has need to be forgiven.” (Thomas Fuller)

Happy reading!

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Self Nurturing: Enjoying the Labyrinth at the Beach

Margo — Mon, 06 Sep 2010 01:36:30 +0000

What joy it was to get out to the beach at St. Augustine today. Of course, we made our usual stop at Zhanra’s for a scrummy breakfast. If you haven’t yet tried their Sunday Brunch it’s time to treat yourself. An incredible buffet of cooked-to-order omelet anyway you want it, quiche, scrambled eggs (plain or dressed up), apple wood smoked sausages and bacon, chorizo soup or gumbo or cheese grits. (I don’t like grits, but these are to die for!!) Then there are fresh biscuits and sausage gravy, and home-made fries. And that’s just the cooked section. Turn the corner of the counter and there’s a whole array of bagels, Danish pastries, fresh fruit, muffins and fresh garden green salad.

Your waiter takes your drink order and also asks if you would like pancakes or French Toast to order. I highly recommend the French Toast. I’m sure the pancakes are wonderful too but I so enjoy their French Toast that I just can’t not have it. This has to be the best Sunday Brunch in town and it’s a deal at $9.99 plus your drink.

So with satisfied stomachs we headed to the beach. It had rained some while we were at breakfast but by the time we headed out it had cleared up and was just a perfect mix of cloud cover and sun. At the beach it was also wonderfully breezy and my soul sang out as the seagulls screamed. Lorelei was already there busily drawing a labyrinth in the sand. After hugs all around I readied my stick and, carefully following Lorelei’s paper design, I drew another labyrinth next to hers.

There is such a focused feeling of peace as I draw a labyrinth. Perhaps it is because I start the design with the central cross section and lay down my words of intention immediately. Today’s words were Hope, Love, Balance and Harmony. Then the gentle circles unwind as I walk and draw the design. As soon as I had completed it, I walked my first meditation. Some people walk the labyrinth quickly. I prefer a slow measured step.

As I walk, I think of what or/and who I want to take into the center and pray about/for. As these thoughts form, other words of intention surface and I stop and inscribe them inside the pathways I have created. Today some of those words were, Delight, Laughter, Compassion, Spirit, Creator, Live, Serenity, Light, Energy, and Enchanted. As I stepped into the center the word Joy came to mind and so, alongside a heart design, I inscribed that word. To complete the center I inscribed the names of those I wanted to enfold within the blessings of the labyrinth.

Shortly after this we noticed an unusual sun-dog form in the sky. Normally sun-dogs carry tinges of rose and yellow. This one was a very luminescent blue-green, and the clouds were swirled around it almost in circles. There were lots of people on the beach today and many of them joined us to walk the labyrinths. Lorelei was very creative today and drew a total of five, which with mine made six. There was a special energy in the labyrinths today as many children danced and ran their way around the circles, some of them asking accompanying parents what the words said as they passed them on their way.

All too soon it was time to head home. We embraced Lorelei and thanked her for her time and energy. Part of me wanted to remain on the beach, that same part that sometimes wants to hop on a plane and just leave. So within my heart I said a centering prayer and returned to the reality of the present moment. I thanked God for my time at the ocean and for good friends and headed home.

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Musings: Life’s Curve Balls

Margo — Sun, 21 Mar 2010 18:26:40 +0000

Just recently life has thrown a few curve balls into my personal space. Nothing drastic, but enough to throw me off balance. And then, of course, there’s the dratted weather, which has thrown enough curve balls into everyone’s territory to create disruptions galore.

My last posting (yes, I know, it’s been two long weeks!), was on 7 March Musings- Freedom, and I shared how sick I had been and how much I was enjoying the freedom of wellness. We had a short interlude of a few days of good weather as I regained my strength, and the first call of order was the garden. So much needed to be done in the way of general tidying and clearing before beginning on the major project which would completely remodel my front yard.

I have to admit that even as I experienced the joy of gardening, I struggled with a certain level of frustration. As much as I wanted/needed to be out doing the garden, especially as I had lost so much time due to bad weather and we didn’t know how long the warm weather was going to last, I also really wanted to be writing. Having two passions is sometimes difficult to manage and the garden passion and the writing passion each carry about equal weight in my heart.

Well, I chose the garden and managed to get a few days good work in as well as immersing myself into the the general mainstream of my daily life. I was on about day five of this readjustment back to normal when the next curve ball arrived and truly took the wind out of my sails.

I had just arrived in St. Augustine for a Body Talk appointment. I pulled into the parking lot, took my phone out of my bag to put it on silent mode, and it rang in my hand. It was my husband calling to let me know that he was in the ER with chest pains “but please don’t get alarmed”!

In hindsight I have learned that my reaction to crisis/alarming news is to back off, disconnect if you will. In that moment I said to my husband, “I’ve just arrived at my appointment in St. Augustine, do you need me there?” He kind of muttered around for a few moments as I cautiously allowed my mind and my heart to re-approach the reality of the situation, then he said, “Yes, I think I’d like you here.”

As I ran in to cancel my appointment before turning the car around and racing back to Jacksonville, I realized what my comment must have sounded like to my husband as he lay on a gurney in the ER. I called him immediately and left a message (they had made him turn his phone off). I told him that even as I had asked that ridiculous question, there had been no doubt that I would go right to the hospital to be with him. I had just needed a moment to allow my fear to subside so that I could get on and do what I needed to do.

I guess for me it is a defense mechanism. Stepping back so that I can allow my head and my heart to kind of sync up together and work in harmony. It’s the kind of mechanism that has us go to numbness or disbelief in the face of personal tragedy. We need that small space of time so that God can step in and hold our heart and our hand, or even pick us right up into His arms, and walk us through the pain and the difficulty of any given tough situation.

I spent the whole of the drive back to Jacksonville in prayer mode. I asked God to protect my husband and surround him with His healing grace. I made a couple of phone calls: one to my daughter to put her in the picture, and two more to dear friends so that I would have my support group in place no matter what.

By the time I got to the hospital I was calm. They had done a bunch of tests on Richard and were beginning to administer some different medications. His EKG’s, chest X-ray, and blood work were OK, but he was still experiencing tightness and pressure in his chest as well as shortness of breath when speaking. They kept him in for observation for a couple of days before sending him home with more medication and instructions for follow-up, including an appointment with the Cardiologist.

It is amazing how a couple of days and a crisis can affect the human system. It was only after getting Richard home and seeing him slowly return to normal that I realized how exhausted my body was. As I went through the process of letting go of the anxiety all I wanted to do was sleep. I also noted how I felt generally irritable, and irritated toward Richard. (Like how dare he put me through that!!).

Stress is a very hard task-master that produces strong emotions and reactions. I am grateful that I know how to recognize stress fairly quickly and can take positive steps to reduce and eliminate it from my life. I booked a massage in the next few days and also returned to my beloved garden, two of the best therapies for stress that I know work for me.

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Musings: The Discomfort of Personal Growth

Margo — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 16:49:58 +0000

I actually started writing the following three paragraphs in the middle of the last posting that I wrote. However, I quickly realized that they did not belong there so, rather than delete them, I saved them as a draft. I figured that if the words had manifest themselves on the page they were important to come back to. Here are the three paragraphs as I wrote them.

As I have been sitting here, stopping from time time to just breath in deeply, I have been checking the news on my info page. I guess the biggest item that has rocked the world in different ways is still the news coming out of Haiti. I have followed this story, as I’m sure many millions of other people have, and have come to realize how difficult it is to take in the reality of such a situation.

No matter how many photos they print, and there have been hundreds, even though they depict the grim reality of the circumstances it is hard to make it a reality in my own life. Story after story carries an underlying sadness, pain, and desperation. It is heartbreaking to think of the level of suffering and helplessness that overwhelms the surviving Haitian population in the aftermath of the earthquake.

Yet even as I understand the meaning behind the words in these stories, and even as I can see clearly what is depicted in all the photos, there is a part of me that is unable to truly comprehend the magnitude of this tragedy. I went through something similar after the tsunami out in Thailand and Indonesia at Christmas a couple of years ago.

So now I will try to pick up the thread of my thought process a week after writing this. As I said, at the time I was sitting outside in my lanai on the first really warm day after much freezing cold weather had not allowed me to take my lap-top outside and work. I have just reread the three paragraphs and remember now sitting out there in the warmth and sunshine, catching up on world-wide news and feeling so strangely detached from the horrors taking place in Haiti.

I am not sure why this is so. I try to practice compassion in a very real way on a daily basis. I am a Christian person who “loves his neighbor”. I am also an intelligent person, so it’s not that I don’t have the brains or the smarts to grasp what is going on over there in Haiti. Neither am I afflicted by learning disabilities that slow my thought processes or skew them somehow.

I have read on numerous occasions that we, the human race, have been so saturated with violence in today’s world that events such as those taking place in Haiti don’t reach down into our hearts, our guts, or they only get halfway there. Modern media thinks nothing of throwing blood, gore, and downright evil at us in the name of “action movies” and the like, and as a result we become inured to the real life stuff.

As I said above, I see the pictures, I read the stories, the facts, but I have a hard time bringing it all into my own perception of reality. I’m not sure where I want to go with all this, or if I need to go anywhere in particular. Of one thing I am sure, the words presented themselves on the page out of my mind so they must have some specific significance.

I know that I do not feel very happy or comfortable about this posting. It has come out in fits and starts, between one interruption and another. Half way through I found myself thinking, “maybe I should just delete it and start a totally new posting”. But there is a part of me that knows the words need to stay on the page.

Perhaps the discomfort that I am feeling is because this article makes me look at a part of me that is not so nice. That part that wants me to just stay in my comfort zone and get on with my ordinary life. After all, don’t I deal with enough of my own pain without taking on the pain of others? But I know that I cannot do that. If I do, I will experience even more discomfort.

So the words stay, the article stands as is, and I battle on through the stuff that maybe I would prefer to ignore. I ask God to help me find the growth that this is leading me to. Hopefully there will be a quantum leap in my spiritual growth, in my prayer practice. Maybe a little more honesty, another small slice of humility, and just a smidgen more courage to keep me on track.

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