Perspective

Perspective is a huge word. Wow, everyone has something going on. We all are human. We all hurt. We all ache. We all love.

We all have a journey. We all have pain we are working to overcome.

No matter how bad our situation is, there are others that are going through worse.

Constantly, I have challenges from life, God, Spirit, however you might characterize it. I will ask what do I work on next, I will get a sense of what to do and continue to work on it. It may be to smile more. It may be to observe my dealings with others rather than reacting. It could be anything. It may be different challenges that build upon one another or I might be jumping around. This is how I heal, how I learn, how I become a better me.

This week has been very intriguing. I have had a bad week healthwise. And I'm having trouble hiding it. I push myself to all extents and I just didn't have it anymore and several saw it. It's one thing for my family members to know some of the limits of this, but when it's pretty bad, things get harder. Tempers flare, frustration ensues, and that's for everyone. Perspective is very deep in this part in that we all are coming from somewhere, but we have to find out where. Our reactions are a road map to the problems, to the pain sometimes. It can be pain from many years ago or from yesterday. Healing those pains in ourself help us to react less to others pain.

I've been opening myself up to this lesson and something unexpected happened. There are those times when people you know have scary situations you never knew about. I feel thankful for what i do have. I am sad they are going through all they are going through.

And this leads us to a lesson for me this week. There's a friendly acquaintance of mine that i ran into twice this week. The first time was no biggie, but a bit unusual. believe it or not, i just don't run into people that much around here. I'll say that and then there will be a huge deluge. And that would be fine 8). We saw a sign for a garage sale with something at the bottom that indicated it was to raise money for a certain disorder. Being that someone in our family has the disorder, we went there and I was surprised to see it was her. The family member affected by this disorder talked with her and she felt really helpless before, so that was good. In addition, she shared a little more of what was going on and it just opened my eyes in a different way. We all need to help each other. But there's that line that we have to help ourselves and everyone has crap to go through (maybe i'm using the word crap because it's literal right now since our toilets are backed up again). But the thing is there is so much to deal with. And this dance of learning and growing and healing is what we call living.

As i am trying to open up to others about my trials, it helps to see someone else do so. It gives me strength. As we ebb and flow in this ocean we call humanity, there is peace and strength in numbers. There is peace in us, sometimes it only is here when we are all working together. That is a very comforting thought.

Reading, New Years Resolutions, etc

Well, I actually have (sort of) kept my New Years resolution so far...

I want to read 1 book per month.

I will start with a little aside... I have finished maybe 3 books in the last 18 months, since the Epilepsy diagnosis. My brain can be mush, so I forget a lot. I'm embarrassed by that, but it's also a fact. I can work with this. I can do this 8)

Soooo, I have been working on it, but didn't quite make it... So I read a comic book Saturday, lol... It was the first one of the Star Wars comics released early last year.

But, I did finish The Dance of Anger by Harriet Goldhor Lerner today. It's about how to observe our actions and how to see that anger is a road map for what we need to heal in ourselves. It really focuses on conflict and how our responsibility for our decisions is paramount. Anger is not a bad thing, but it can be more of a tool to help us be better and heal. I can't tell you how empowering this book has been. I bought it years ago, but wasn't quite ready for it... That's true with so much, I suppose 8)

I'm working on PS I Love you by Cecelia Ahern for February. This movie came to me at such a low time in my life. Though it was sad (in a sense, downright depressing), it gave me so much clarity for that time... What is true about everything is we are constantly peeling layers to deal with our past, our biology, our humanity, and everything else. Sometimes, it feels like we revisit the same lessons, but honestly, I think we get a little deeper everytime we revisit... That spirical motion is really how life is, as it is anything but linear. When I found this movie years ago (I saw it at the dollar theater alone), I feel it helped me continue to grow and make some huge changes in my life. I realized then and there how much I put into the thought of love for another that I had missed the love in and for me. I was able to gather the strength to realize I needed to let go of an unrequited love, but honestly it helped me with seeing more about the acceptance I wanted in many of my relationships, and how I had to better fill that for myself.  My thoughts on love, on life, were even more obscure. I was trying to put myself into a mold that just didn't fit to be the "right person" for someone else... I had done that before and it didn't work so well (ended in divorce). I was able to get so much out of that movie. The book is good, but since it is quite a bit different, it's a bit difficult to not feel let down by it so far, though it is a wonderful book so far in its' own right.

Update - It looks like I will finish PS I Love you tonight. over 500 pages in a day. It has been awhile since I've finished a book that quickly 8) I love the differences of this book versus the movie. Her interactions with her family are especially interesting, but after reading the Anger book, I see conflictual triangles in her life as well. But I thoroughly recommend it.

So here is my reading goal. I hope to stick with it!!