Archive for the ‘Behavior’ Category

This is not a political blog. I have always advocated “the highest good for all concerned” as my mission statement and I go the extra mile to find just that within everything I write.  Sometimes, however, important choices need to be made at crossroads, and I believe we as a People have arrived at one.

I have listened to Glenn Beck on and off for the past three years.  I found him entertaining and intellectually curious, a combination I enjoyed. I thought his tag line “the fusion between entertainment and enlightenment” was aptly put.  I sometimes questioned how far out on a limb he was walking… and where the fine line ended between his entertaining persona and his intellectual curiosity; however, I none-the-less felt that overall he provided a “cut above” in talk radio. 

He seemed not so much partisan as he did genuine.

To be up front, I was a life-long Democrat (now Independent) who voted for John McCain.  I did so not with a happy heart but because I had an intuitive feeling that there was too much unknown, untested and, frankly, disturbing about Barack Obama and the people with whom he surrounded himself.  I listened, as Glenn Beck started down the road of alleging more than discomfort with the President but rather alleging mal-intent.  As Beck’s allegations grew and intensified, along with his substantiated fact finding, my concerns grew and intensified as well.

I believe today is a turning point.  Like Glenn Beck, I too now pray for the country.

Beck has played on air this morning audio from April 2008 of Van Jones, Special Adviser to the President on Green Jobs.  It is the straw that will break that camel’s back.  Van Jones speaks, unabashedly, of undeniably Marxist intentions.  He sets forth, unmasked, what he (and I now believe many surrounding President Obama) intend for this country.  It is not what I intend and I know with certainty it is not what most people intend whovalue freedom, privacy and personal responsibility.

The President is a smart man.  He knows who surrounds him.  He is either in agreement with their intentions, or, he is not certain enough of what he believes in and strong enough to stand for it. 

Either way, the crossroad is here, now, for you and me.

Each citizen must decide for himself and herself what their basic values are and then stand for them. Be ready to stand for them in every way at every opportunity.  Be ready to voice your stand.  Be ready to be demeaned for it, marginalized for it and rejected for it.  And be certain that no voice other than your own has any more certainty or power.  Get your strength from within.  Fear nothing and no one.  Know that you are looking at and listening to an illusion wherever fear and urgency are the clarion calls. 

I take no political side on this. I take the side of inner guidance and personal responsibility. I take the side of full disclosure and good intention. I take the side of opposing all who would impose their view upon me while attempting to dishonor my own. 

I am hopeful that Glenn Beck has made his voice so public and so widespread, that to harm or silence him would be it’s own affirmation about the lengths to which those now in power will go to try and force their view of reality upon others.

This is a potentially glorious moment in our societal evolution.  I have no doubt that just as a lit room obliterates darkness, so too will the light of truth obliterate those who are motivated by power and the desire to oppress the spirit of man.

We are at the crossroad and it is the night before the dawn.

Stand for what you believe in and hold high the light of truth.  

Five months ago I wrote an entry titled “Christ Consciousness” that daily continues to receive more hits that any other blog I’ve written since.  So I asked myself why?

I think I know the answer.

It all rests on the difference between reality and illusion….between religion and spirituality.

Most of what we are concerned with, what our minds are preoccupied with on a daily basis, is…quite literally…a distraction from the only thing in life that truly matters: being in a constant state of co-creating with love.   While this may sound unrealistic given the practicalities of life, and somewhat philosophical as well, to the contrary, nothing could be more realistic or practical.

The opposite of reality is illusion.  How many of us know, by way of first-hand experience, that what we’ve been taught, told and sold will satisfy us and make us happy is simply an empty promise.  How many of us “acquire” and “achieve” accomplishments, degrees and “stuff” only to realize that none of it makes a meaningful difference in how joyful or satisfying our lives are?   That’s because the world of achieving, acquiring and materialism is a world created not by the One Mind capable of creating a Universe and more….but rather by only one aspect of that Mind….and a misapplied aspect at that….called the human ego.   Everything ego makes is temporary.  You know it and I know it.  If it’s temporary, then it will come and it will go. And if it can go, then where does that leave us other than in a perpetual state of anticipating and fearing abandonment and lack?

T o the contrary, what is real, and neither illusory nor temporary, is that which Creator is…which is All There Is.  Creator is eternal creativity, ever-expanding outward by way of Its Unified Thought, in a field of loving awareness of Self.  What we have forgotten, or denied, is that we are part of that Unified Thought thus making us co-creators in loving awareness of self.  If Who You Are is eternal, ever-expanding, unified and lovingly aware then you must be something much more than either your body or your ego since both are limited and finite.   Which is why identifying with our bodies or trying to “gain” self love through achievement or acquisition is so unsatisfying and must, ultimately, fail.

What has been forgotten can be remembered.  What has been denied has occurred because when we deny something in another it’s because we are not aware of it in ourselves. The way to heal our own sense of unworthiness, our own alienation from the state of wholeness that is our birthright, is to see others as whole, healed, and worthy in themselves.  By so doing, you return them to the Only Mind There Is and to the Reality where peace and joy reside. 

What you see in others is what is in you.  Therefore, the blessing you have given them becomes yours.

Which is why I think the previous entry “Christ Consciousness” is getting so much attention… for it strikes a deep knowing within each of us.

                                       The way home is lovingly with and through one another. 

This year marks our arrival at a crossroad.  We are exactly 40 years out from Woodstock and Woodstock was exactly 40 years out from The Great Depresssion.  “So what’s the crossroad?” you ask.  If you give me a moment or two I’ll explain; but first, let’s take a look at what’s happening right now that’s causing public outcries, Republican and Democrat stone-throwing, and so much general discontent.

Most of us are aware that there’s something like a war being waged between what I’ll call, for lack of more accurate terms, Conservatives and Liberals.  While these have come to be completely meaningless terms, using them will make identifying the combatants easier.

The instant battle in this war seems to be over health care reform…although this is just the latest in a series of public objections to what appears to some as increasingly and, increasingly unacceptable, government ineptitude and intervention into the private sector.  The important words in the previous sentence are the words “to some”…because how many and who they are seems to be over what the battle is currently being waged.

Conservatives say the battle is inextricably tied to the intention of the Founding Fathers, the Constitution, and even survival of the Republic. They are united in their opposition and claim their numbers are increasing daily.  Liberals say the battle is tied to compassion for those who have been marginalized by both prior Administrations and private sector greed, and, ultimately, is inextricably tied to our financial solvency and overall economic survival going forward. They, too, are united in their opposition and believe their adherents are the majority, and have been for some time, albeit a less vocal one.

So which of them is right?  Oh, sorry.  Wrong question.

So, what is the Truth?

First, to the combatants: both are right and both are wrong.  You see, its the old saying “there are three sides to every story. Yours, mine and the Truth.”

What we do now, about health care reform and everything else that’s on the table or will be, is very much about what the Founding Fathers intended.  It is about the future of the Republic.  It is about compassion and action for those marginalized by institutional biases and greed.  It is about what kind of participant we, the United States…and we, as Co-Creators in the future of humankind…will be in the evolving consciousness of life during this millennium, on this planet, and beyond.

That’s where, combined, both groups have it right. 

The Truth, however, isn’t found within either argument and is bigger than both combined.  The Truth has nothing to do with right or wrong. The Truth isn’t about perception, judgment or separation.  The Truth is about harmony and Oneness.  The truth is found at the crossroad.

So, let’s return to The Great Depression, Woodstock and that crossroad.

Woodstock was emblematic of a vocal, and seemingly brief, generational rejection of the materialism and direction this nation had pursued following The Great Depression.  I say “brief” because many of we Boomers who later got caught up in that very materialism, also lost sigh of the fact that in so doing we became seduced and distracted by it.  Our distraction led to our abdicating responsibility for heading in the very direction we had earlier opposed.  From 1990-2008 life got faster, more materially comfortable, and more technologically dependent. It also got more stressful, more alienated, less meaningful and less joyful.

If The Great Depression was the beginning, and Woodstock the milestone, then we have arrived at the crossroad.

The Truth?

The Constitution was divinely inspired. But so are you.  So are we all.  We’ve just forgotten our purpose. 

Our purpose isn’t to accomplish anything more than remembering that we are not what we make, what we consume, or what we bank.  We are One Being.  All we have is all we need.  We are what we share and give away in joyful knowing that we are of One Mind and One Heart.  Sustenance and Abundance are our birthrights.  We are Co-Creators in the ongoing miracle that is the only Creation that ever occurred or ever will.

No government, no political party, no employer, no spouse is your Source of supply.  One Mind is.  Connect with that Mind; know that it is within You as it is within everyone else.  Be joyful about that knowing and share your gifts and your part in it freely… knowing that the adage “All you have is what you give away” is about trusting in the only Truth there is.

It isn’t True because I say it is, either. 

It just Is.

Or, better said, “I Am That I Am.”

Its been my policy since inception of this blog to write from a positive perspective and to always bring you the most inspiring message. Regular readers know that my oft quoted motto is “the highest good for all concerned.”  I’ll get there today as I always do.

But today, the road there is first through a dark and unseemly place. There’s simply no way around it.

In the 13 years during which I practiced Divorce law, there wasn’t a single case in which a husband had an extramarital affair that the wife did not know.  She always knew.  She may not have admitted it to herself… she may have blocked that knowing out… she may not have known the details… but in every single case she knew.  I can make this assertion with certainty because whether she admitted it to me at the beginning of the case…or somewhere later down the road…my clients whose husband’s had so behaved always, ultimately, recognized and acknowledged that they knew.

I tell you this because something is wrong in America. 

We all know it.

We may not want to admit it.  We may be trying to block out our knowing with diversions such as Michael Jackson or Bernie Madoff or All Star Games or summer vacations… but we know it.  We may not know the details or be able to state with certainty how or when it went wrong, and continues to go wrong, but we know it.  We may not want to admit it because to do so would mean we’d have to also admit that where it’s headed is untenable and that would mean we’d each have to step up and actually do something about it.

There isn’t time or space here for details.  Perhaps President Obama’s appointments to the offices of “Science Czar” and “Green Jobs Czar” (scroll down and read the “Political Evolution” section of the Wikipedia link) make the broader case for me.  These are people with disturbing histories who have been dropped into positions of authority and power and whose actions are unaccountable to Congress.

I don’t think that ruminating over what is wrong or ignoring what we instinctively feel in our “guts” is what matters. I think what matters is what are we going to do about it?

In hindsight I don’t know if any of my former clients could have saved their marriages by confronting the reality of those affairs at the time and taking a stand based upon self-respect and dignity. But here’s the thing. They’ll never know. What they do know is that burying their heads in the sand only prolonged their pain, diminished their self-esteem and cost them a fortune in dignity and legal fees.  Let us learn a little, or a lot, from their mistakes.

Something is wrong in America.

Each of us who knows this needs to act.  So far, I have two ideas.

The first is to speak truth to power and not be afraid to say, every day… every chance we have…to anyone we can… that, in fact, something is wrong in America and its time to change that.

Secondly, we need a Gandhi or Dr. King. We need a peaceful march on Washington and we need it in numbers so large that our collective voices cannot be silenced.

This is all I know for certain at this point. But if we can get those two accomplished, I am certain the next logical step will emerge in its proper time.

If you agree that we need that march on Washington, and that together we can do it, please pass this on.  I welcome all who are ready to admit that something is wrong in America and are also ready to do something about it.

Carole

P.S.

Because you often feel like one voice singing in the darkness… I know I sometimes do… I’ve pasted the lyrics to Barry Manilow’s song “One Voice.”  

Just One Voice,
Singing in the darkness,
All it takes is One Voice,
Singing so they hear what’s on your mind,
And when you look around you’ll find
There’s more than

One Voice,
Singing in the darkness,
Joining with your One Voice,
Each and every note another octave,
Hands are joined and fears unlocked,
If only

One Voice
Would start it on its own,
We need just One Voice facing the unknown,
And then that One Voice would never be alone,
It takes that One Voice.

It takes that One Voice.

Just One Voice
Singing in the darkness,
All it takes is One Voice,
Shout it out and let it ring.

Just One Voice,
It takes that One Voice,
And everyone will sing!

         Whenever there is an occurrence that generates such massive focusing of consciousness as the death of Michael Jackson its a moment filled with opportunity.

         But for whom and for what?

         The very day that news of Jackson’s death broke, I was browsing through Barnes and Noble and came upon a book titled “Frequency” by Penny Peirce. The title caught my attention since as long as I can remember I have been known to say “We are all energy operating at different frequencies.” Since I had just “asked” the Universe for an inspirational message, I opened the book randomly and read the page.

         What I read was remarkable.

         If I can paraphrase, the author posits that since our bodies live in the present so must our minds. When we linger too long in thoughts that are either past or future, we fundamentally leave our bodies without consciousness…or as my friend Marlene likes to say, without the computer that runs it. What’s the result? Its stagnation…non-action…no movement. Think about your computer without an operating system. What can it do? Now think about your body without the benefit of your mind’s attention. It’s like that computer… and it’s not about to do anything either.  So what you get when you leave our body to trip the light fantastic is nothing.  Literally, you get stagnation in your life. Why?  Because since the only thing that exists is the Present, the Now… when your thoughts are any place other than Here and Now you are creating NO-THING-NESS in your Present. Your are creating EMPTINESS in your Life.

         I don’t know if “It takes a village to raise a child” but it definitely takes a mind and body working in both harmony and real Time to create a Life.

         How do your know if your mind and body are in sync?  Frequency. 

         Think about those days when everything just seems to be going right. You’re energetic, things fall into place, you can seemingly do no wrong. Now contrast that with days when your devoid of energy and everything you attempt feels like an uphill battle. Know what the difference is?  When things are going right, your operating at what Peirce calls your “home frequency.”  Its that vibrational rate, default rate if you will, at which your mind and body are set to maximize creativity in its various forms.  But when the opposite is true, and it all seems a futile battle, its because you’ve “left the room”, so to speak, by separating your thoughts from the Present and thereby also left your body without the means to function effectively in the material world.   You become the laptop without the operating system.  Nothing’s going to happen.

         So what’s all this got to do with Michael Jackson’s death? Or Bernard Madoff’s conviction and sentencing? Or the aftermath of the Iranian election for that matter?

         Well, while these events may be happening in real time, or close to it, are they actually happening in the real time of your own life?  I think not. If you and millions of other people around the globe have their consciousness endlessly “looping” around these distractions… and others like them… then whose minding the store? 

         The store being your body and, hence, your Life?

         I would suggest that if you’re focused on anything other than what needs to be done in your own life this day that you are guaranteeing a drain on your “home frequency” and leaking energy away from what is possible in your Life.

         Michael Jackson died. Rest in peace. Bernie Madoff is sentenced to 150 years. I guess Rest in Peace is appropriate there, too. The Iranian election is over and there’s civil unrest. I wish them freedom. But a blog had to be written and food shopping had to be done and a client needed my input and I had to exercise and meditate and my daughter will be home soon and dinner has to be made and I have target shooting tonight and piano practice.

         As long as my consciousness is operating at my home frequency I can accomplish all of those things and much, much more. Without it, I’m a bump on a log.

         So next time things seem to be slow or uphill, perhaps you’ve left your body unattended to pursue a distraction or two that has no hope of getting you where it is you really want to go in Life. That’s fine… as long as you’re not wondering or complaining about how come you’re not getting what it is you really want out of Life.

    

         A few weeks ago I po sted a blog entry about a “miracle” healing. What continues to surprise me is that the post has continued to get a steady stream of visitors each day since, without any promotion from me. Now that’s somewhat unusual because what normally happens is that posts get a lot of visitors initially when first published and then that traffic dies off but for occasional, usually diminishing, activity. However, not so the “Miracle Healing” entry. This tells me that it’s word-of-mouth, so to speak, that’s generating the continued traffic.

         So what is it about that post that’s generating all the buzz?  Allow me to digress for a moment.

         Those of you who read my blog know I have written about an attempted suicide at age 24. You also may have seen me on YouTube talk about that experience and how it changed my life and formed the basis for the spiritual and philosophical way I live my life today. Perhaps the most frequent point I try and make when public speaking about the attempt is that “people who try to commit suicide don’t really want to die. They’ve just temporarily misplaced hope.” 

         I think the words “misplaced hope” hold the secret to the popularity of the “Miracle Healing” post.

         We continue to live in extraordinarily stressful times and stress takes it’s toll. Usually, on the body. Dis-ease and illness are rampant. Particularly cancer. The numbers of people who have been, and are each day, diagnosed with some form of cancer are escalating at an alarming rate. Yet cancer is just one example. The human body is simply not designed to withstand the pressures… particularly the mental and emotional pressures…that result from the way we live. Nor are we meant to live at this pace. Plus, there are all the environmental pollutants that have been, and continue to be, spewed and dumped into the Earth and It’s atmosphere.   With so much pressure and so much illness, it’s easy to lose sight of the fact that we have the ability to change how we live as well as to heal ourselves in non-traditional ways.

         In other words, it’s easy to misplace hope in the as-yet-unknown.

         Enter my post about the miracle healing.  I think people read it and are moved by the miraculous, non-traditional healing that took place. Sure. It’s a great story and a true one.

         More importantly, however, I think they find in it that elusive thing called “hope” that the seemingly irreversible can, in fact, be reversed. So whether it’s an illness they or someone they know is struggling with, or a relationship gone awry, or a business venture turned liability, or a troubled child….whatever it is… they are reminded, encouraged to renew their faith, that hope is never lost, only misplaced.

         I could not have been part of that healing had I not had faith and hope that I could somehow make a difference. And the patient could not have improved had he not also had, on some level, faith and hope in his own survival. I believe that. And while you may not, what matters is that both he and I did and the result speaks for itself.

         I think we live in a world where people are hungry for hope. It’s the effort to feed that hunger that is driving the ongoing traffic to the “Miracle Healing” post.  I am encouraged by all the interest. I hope those readers who are called there find what it is they have gone in search of.

         Hope.

    

>        I don’t watch a lot of TV or listen to much radio. But there’s always news that filters through one way or another and the Internet is certainly one of those ways. So in the past few days, I’ve been unable to avoid some rather nasty comments and observations flying back and forth between what appears to be the political Right and Left.

Here are a just a few in list format, for expediency sake and, to make the point:
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size=”3″ face=”Courier New”>      – Letterman trashing Governor Sarah Palin’s 14-year-old-daughter by joking that she was “knocked up by Alex Rodrigues during the 7th inning stretch.”

         – size=”3″ face=”Courier New”>Letterman referring to Sarah Palin’s fashion sense as the “slutty, flight-attendant look.”

     – Bill Maher saying Former First Lady Nancy Reagan had lunch at the White House with Michelle Obama and, not quite sure who the Michelle Obama was, asked the First Lady “not to just move the furniture around but to do some dusting.” size=”3″ face=”Courier New”>

size=”3″ face=”Courier New”>      – Rush Limbaugh playing “Dancing Queen” from Mama Mia with a voice-over imitation of Congressman  Barney Frank singing, instead, the words “Banking Queen.” size=”3″ face=”Courier New”>

         First, let me dismiss the politics. I’m a life-long Democrat until about two weeks ago when I moved and had to re-register to vote. I registered as an Independent. I’m pretty much done with both Parties’ greed and corruption. As a Democrat, and now an Independent, I never particularly liked Barney Frank.

         But the Limbaugh parody was disgusting as are all the others.

         There’s a great line from the movie The American President where Michael Douglas, portraying the President running for re-election, gives a press conference and addresses his Republican opponent who has been avoiding debate on policy issues and instead attacking the widowed President and his love interest on moral grounds. Douglas says, “If you want to come at me with a character debate just tell me where and when and I’ll be there. But we’ve got serious problems that require serious solutions and your fifteen minutes of fame are up. My name is Andrew Wade and I am the President.”

         I’d like to paraphrase, if I may.

         To Letterman, Maher, Limbaugh and all the others: “We are living through a precarious time of extraordinary change. Divisions based upon differences have plagued us for thousands of years and led to unimaginable suffering. These are serious times that require respectful approaches. Harmony in diversity is the goal. If you can’t grasp that reality and stop being part of the problem, I can assure you that your fifteen minutes of fame are about to be up. My name is Carole Goldstein and I am a Citizen Lightworker.

         With so much tough news, economic and otherwise, it may seem as little “Pollyanna-ish” to be writing about patience. And yet, during times of transition, such as we are now experiencing, there may be few topics more relevant or more important than patience. 

         I am amazed at how many people seem to be in a state of limbo in some aspect or another of their lives. Everywhere I look I see people in transition…from career to housing to relationships to health. And by limbo I mean that how things have been for them most of their lives are, suddenly, no longer the same and yet no alternative has show up to replace that which is no longer working, or no longer here, or no longer viable. Just among my immediate friends, I know four graduate educated, formerly successful career women who have lost their jobs or left their careers voluntarily and no career alternative…not even a job let alone a career…seems to be opening up for them. I know three people with serious health challenges.

    Just yesterday I was talking with one of them and I said, “You can’t imagine the size of the capital letter ‘P’ that’s on the word ‘Patience’ we’re all being asked to exhibit.”  For some reason, my comment struck her as funny and she laughed. When she stopped laughing, she said in all seriousness, “I get it. Thanks.”

    I had just blurted it out but as soon as I said it I “got it” too.

    No matter from what perspective you look at things, the lesson is the same. If you’re a student of evolution, it’s one of those periods when both the Earth and humankind are going through geological, meteorological and biological changes that have dotted the history of our development as a planet and a people for all of recorded time. If your technological, its a time of unprecedented growth and speed. If you’re religious, for many its the transition from one prophesied time to another…for good or for bad…depending on your religious orientation. If your spiritual, its the necessary expansion of the capacity of human consciousness from a lower to a higher frequency on the path to Oneness.

    Whichever one rings true, they all have one thing in common: Change

    Change may appear to occur in an instant but in reality its a process. When you are in the middle of a process over which you have no control, your options are to fear the lack of control and the temporary unknown or, as the colloquial expression goes, roll with the punches. Rolling with the punches requires a certain amount of patience. Or should I say acceptance of what Is.

    There simply are times when nothing you do makes any noticeable difference. It isn’t necessarily because you’re doing anything wrong or doing it inadequately…its a matter of Divine Timing.  Divine Timing requires certain “pieces” to be in place, so to speak, before certain other pieces can be moved into position. To do the latter before the former would be to impede the “natural” flow of things..or in more human and philosophical terms…interfere with the Highest Good For All Concerned.

    After all, we all want the Highest Good For All Concerned. Or do we?

    Maybe that’s what this patience thing is about after all. Maybe we’re being asked to wait…to endure…until all of us catches up in our understanding that we’re all connected and if some of us prosper to the point of material obscenity while others of us suffer from the obscenity of the most heinous deprivation…then we’re ultimately holding ourselves back because there’s only One of Us.

    Sometimes, no matter how well I plan things, my timing is off. Ever have that happen to you? I suspect the answer is yes. Who hasn’t? Well, I have that answer to that query.

    God.

    God’s timing is never off. Its perfect. Its Divine. It’s Divine Timing.

    So, if things aren’t working out as you planned, or hoped or continue to strive for, just remember to be patient. Somewhere out of sight is a clock calibrated to the Highest Good For All Concerned.

    And the alarm is set.
         

    

The most difficult blogs to write are the most personal ones for they expose you “belly-up.” This is one of them. It’s particularly tricky to write this one because, in addition to the opening for personal exposure and the criticism that can follow, I recently came to an awareness about my own propensity to judge others and in order to write this entry I have to walk a fine line between observation and judgment.  But here goes. 

I have previously written about my divorce and the fact that we have a 16-year-old daughter so there’s no need to elaborate here other than to remind you of both.

Just this week, our daughter had a doctor’s appointment for a minor issue and my ex-husband agreed to pick her up from school and take her, since he had been unable to during his normal Parenting Time with her last week. When I was able to check my calendar, I realized that I couldn’t pick her up after the appointment as my day was full with commitments through late evening. So, I asked him if he would also bring her to my home after the appointment.

He refused without giving a reason.

When I inquired “why” he replied, “Because I have a full day and don’t feel like driving anymore then I need to

.”  When I suggested that I generally do all of the driving for her and that she had heard his reply and was hurt by it, he said he would be “happy to explain it to her” two days later when he took her to the appointment.  I further suggested that he might want to call her now, rather than later, as she was obviously disappointed and hurt…feeling unimportant and like an inconvenience to him. His response to that was “If she needs to she can call me.”

I want to repeat what he said: “If she needs to she can call me.”

I was married to this person for almost 17 years and I take responsibility for allowing him, over that period of time, to chip away at my self-esteem by exchanging my personal power for the need to be loved by, and compatible with, him.  And, in hindsight, I had pretty much figured out how that had occurred.  Even our daughter had said to me, post-separation, “You were always too easy on him. No matter how he treated you, all he ever had to do was say ‘I’m sorry’ and you’d forgive him.”  That’s tough to hear from a then 15-year-old who you know is forming her model of a woman after you… and her model for relationships after her parent’s marriage.

But I’ll tell you what was even tougher to hear than that.

When he said that sentence, ” If she needs to she can call me,” I heard him tip-toeing down the path of a pattern of manipulation that is the slippery slope to emotional abuse. He had said something hurtful and insensitive and now he was trying to see if he could get her to come to him for the apology he owed her.

He was planting the seeds of emotional control. 

Had she complied, those seeds could then take root.  Each time such an opportunity would then arise in the future to solidify the pattern… he would take it, knowing she was a participant.  And each time she acquiesced and went toward that which was the source of her pain, he would have gained a little more control over her and she would have relinquished a little more of her self-esteem and personal power.

The good news is I got in the way. In a good way.

I used it as an opportunity to talk with her about dignity, self-esteem, male-female relationships, and the different types of abuse…emotional, psychological and physical. We spoke about healthy relationships and the importance of knowing where your boundaries are.

Finally, we spoke about being able to say to yourself, if not to anyone else, “No thank you. The price is too great” and so to be able to  “pass” on what’s being offered with confidence in knowing that your dignity is not for sale and betrayal of Self is never an option.

One caveat… because I need to be careful as I walk that observational/judgmental line I mentioned earlier.

I don’t think my ex-husband is a malevolent person. I don’t think he consciously sets out to seek that level of control.  He obviously has his own needs and insecurities that cause him to take that approach rather than expose himself belly-up. But that’s no longer my concern.

Our daughter is.

Abusive relationships don’t start out in the deep end. They develop slowly over time and, like everything else, it takes two. The one sure way to avoid them is to be self-confident, self-aware, and unwilling to trade anything for what appears to be love.  Love doesn’t possess, control or hurt. And it’s NEVER the result of a bargain between two people…no matter what’s being exchanged.

Hopefully, our daughter knows this and has learned it from her parents.

There is an old saying, “You teach what you have to learn.”

 

As I type, news is breaking around the U.S. Government’s takeover/purchase of General Motors. As I listen and read, all I can think about is how hard it is to get anything accomplished at a State or Federally owned/operated agency. Think about Motor Vehicles, Social Security or City Hall for that matter. Ever been in one of those lines or encapsulated in a time warp by the inefficiency and delays? Now, the manufacturing and selling of automobiles is about to fall into the abyss.

Segue.

I have a 16-year-old daughter who puts just enough energy into everything she does to get by. Even the things she likes doing! She simply isn’t motivated to do more than the bare minimum it takes to get things done. Yesterday, she and I had one more of the many heated discussions that take place around her approach.  Usually, I mention words like “lazy” or “princess” but this time I suggested that her standard is mediocrity.  Now while you may think that was an unkind observation to have (and more so, to share) it was actually the first time I ever saw a light go on in her head around what is usually her dismissal of my complaints that she hasn’t finished what she began, or in the alternative,”finished” with aspects of the task or goal still incomplete.

So what do government and my 16-year-old have in common?  In a word: Mediocrity.

But let’s face it. Such aspirations aren’t limited to my two examples. I could go on. And on. And on.  Blame it on the technology or the pace at which we live, but there is no denying that most people in this country have settled into reduced expectations of themselves and everyone else. 

We don’t anticipate excellence. We accept mediocrity.

So what’s the harm?

Mediocrity, by definition, implies a lack of caring about the end product. It’s about “average-ness” and “second rated-ness.” Its about expediency and profit over quality and value. When you choose not to care about the quality of what you do, when you don’t give it your best, you not only make a statement about what you think of yourself, you also set in motion events that lead to the devaluation of other people, lifeforms and things.

It is definitely a choice you get to make.  In every situation, you have the opportunity to decide how much energy, integrity, and authenticity you will bring to what needs to be accomplished. You get to define and apply the standard that best represents who you are. No one else gets to make that call.

Lowering your standards is the slippery slope that leads to mediocrity, and less. So why do people do it? Because it’s easier and quicker than the effort and time it takes to achieve excellence. So whether it’s about doing the job you’re paid to do, completing your homework, or choosing who you spend you life with, mediocrity gets you something…albeit not something that necessarily enlivens or empassions you… or anyone else for that matter.

Mediocrity doesn’t lead to feeling good about yourself. It leads, ultimately, to not feeling. That’s the slippery slope. Mediocrity is a denial of the Divinity within each of Us.

We exist to awaken and become conscious around Self-Realization. When such awakening occurs, it is to know for certain what remarkably unique creations we are and how the possibilities for our own creations are boundless and endless…constrained only by our vision and an unwavering determination to be the best we can be.