Archive for the ‘Behavior’ Category

>    There’s enough national news this morning around personal responsibility to write about…Britney Spears and her children, or the woman who “introduced” the rapist to the child he later videotaped raping. Lack of personal responsibility is everywhere. And so, for the past week, I’ve had my own lessons in it and think they’re worth sharing.
    We had the hardwood floors re-finished in our home this past week. After obtaining 3 estimates, we chose the one who’s price was “in the middle” of the three, not just for price but because the young man seemed reputable and straightforward. He began the job a week ago yesterday. The first day was sanding off the old finish. The second day began the staining process.
    That’s when I began to feel sick.
    On the third day, the first of three coats of polyurethane sealant was applied.    
    That’s when I began to feel sicker.
    It was very hot on the third day so by early evening my husband wanted to close up the windows and put the air conditioning on. I didn’t want to because I wanted the ventilation to stay open to dispersing the awful smell but the contractor said that would be fine.  My breathing soon became labored, my throat burned and my chest hurt. I was also very tired. I told my husband how I was feeling and said it was the product. He said I was being an “alarmist” but agreed, reluctantly, to open the windows. By the next day I was much worse.
    I told the contractor he could not apply any more of the sealant and I wanted the toll free number for the manufacturer whom I then called and was told we should have been warned to vacate the premises for the first 3-5 days following application. When I told the contractor, he called the manufacturer and had that confirmed.
    My family and I moved to a hotel immediately and have lived there for the past 4 nights.
    On Saturday I called the contractor who had given us the highest estimate. He uses a dust-free system and eco-compliant products. Although booked through November, he graciously agreed to have his cousin Nick (a school teacher who works for him in the summers) come to our home the next day (Sunday) and strip the floors, re-stain and re-seal them. Nick worked from 8AM until near midnight and the job was completed in one day.
    We moved back into our house yesterday. My lungs still hurt.
    The first contractor is returning our deposit and paying for our hotel and food expenses. I guess so. He’s very angry at both his distributor and the manufacturer “for not educating” him on the product’s hazards.
    Lot’s of lessons here.
     1. The manufacturer should have labeled the product with adequate warnings. The container had no such warning.
     2. The distributor should know the hazards of what he/she is distributing.
     3. The contractor should have educated himself, and advised his customers accordingly, concerning the hazards of the products he elected to use.
     4. My intuition is the best advice I can get. If I feel something is harmful to me or my family, I should act on that feeling and not acquiesce to another’s perspective (even if the “other” is my husband).
     5. My mother is fond of saying “cheap is dear.” While not always true, it’s important to be educated, as a consumer, as to the basis for significant discrepancies in price.
    On my last call with the original contractor, he said he was thinking about suing the distributor and the manufacturer for “failing to educate” him in the dangers. Well, maybe he has a case and maybe not. I’m a former lawyer and if anyone would likely be thinking about suing anybody it would be me.
    But here’s the thing.
    It’s easy to sue because that mitigates personal responsibility. And that makes us feel better about ourselves. But in the end, if there were no lawyers, (and many live for that day) there would be no choice but to learn form our mistakes and become the wiser for them.
    I could sue. Especially if my health continues to be a problem. But those of you who read my blog regularly know that I’m all about finding the highest message for all concerned. And there is one here, as well.
    It’s in all of our best interest to take our time (a challenge in this hurried world) and be thorough in our choices, trusting in our perceptions, and bold enough to follow them through when the message is clear.
    The second contractor, who used products that were not harmful, that comply with the strictest environmental standards, who helped us out of a difficult and dangerous situation on a days notice, and who did an outstanding job by working on a Sunday from almost sunrise to midnight is an example of the right way to approach personal responsibility, integrity and commitment to excellence.
    Instead of a lawsuit, why not a commercial? It’s so much more positive.
    If you need hardwood floors installed, or refinished, and want it done right, contact Joe Stone’s Hardwood Floors at 856.478.0022
    I love his business logo.
    “A Step In the Right Direction.“
    Now doesn’t that say it all.

>    The candid photo accidentally taken by tourists of a Moroccan woman walking down a roadside carrying a child on her back who may be Madeleine McCann, the 3-year-old British toddler missing from a Portugal vacation resort since May is heart breaking for several reasons.
    The obvious reason is that if this is the McCann child her trauma, and that of her parents seeing her as she is depicted with strangers,  must be overwhelmingly painful. Having a daughter of my own, I don’t even want to imagine being in such a terrible situation.
    The less obvious reason is that if one thinks about how easily the child in this photo could be Madeleine, or any other unsuspecting child, then one must confront the responsibility we all have for the illegal baby and child slave labor trades worldwide. In a 2006 article by Kristen Lingowitz, she reports on child slave labor as follows:
       “..throughout Asia and South and Central America it has become very
prevalent. Children as young as four years old are being held captive
and forced to do work that the average American would find
inconceivable. Worldwide, there is an estimated 250 million children
between the ages of five and fourteen working in developing countries
around the globe.”
    In addition, the World Health Organization reports that in Asia alone, an estimated 20-40 million children toil in debt servitude.
    Madeleine McCann is not the typical case although, if alive and not found, her fate may be typical. And while she was not born into poverty in a third-world country, or abandoned somewhere to an unknown fate, we can perhaps be the wiser as a result of her tragic experience.
    Madeleine McCann’s parents were vacationing at a Portugal resort when they went to enjoy a dinner with friends elsewhere in the complex, leaving their three small children alone in a hotel room. It was under those circumstances that Madeleine disappeared. While I am not judging the parents for their action, or blaming them for their daughter’s plight, the obvious question arises: Is dinner out with friends worth the risk of placing a child or children at risk for harm?
    Everyone must answer that question for themselves and take responsibility for their decision. I know that when our daughter, now 14, was between the ages of 2 and 5, we never even went out to dinner leaving her with a sitter. We simply didn’t go out. And as she got older, unless she was in summer camp (and with only one exception) we have never vacationed without her.
    This is not to say our approach was correct or the only way to deal with raising a child while finding necessary and independent adult time. But it is to say that once one makes the decision to bring a life into this world, there begins a stage wherein there’s little room for ego gratification and self-indulgence…and even less room for a margin of error in regard to the child’s safety and wellbeing.
    When we were adopting our daughter, my husband (who had been  married previously and raised two sons) told me that “once we have a child, there will be no time for us.” I listened. But somewhere I thought he was saying there would be less time for us. I simply could not believe there would be no time.
    It’s 12 years later and he was, literally, correct. There is no time because raising a child is a full time job if you want to do it right…or even try to. Romantic dinners, adult only vacations and private time, while nice and perhaps even necessary, need to be re-prioritized to a lesser degree of importance where the safety and well being of the child is not compromised.
    My heart goes out to Madeleine McCann and her family. My heart goes out as well to every child suffering under the weight of neglect and abuse. We should all be pained as members of the human race for those millions of children worldwide that are the object of greed and cruelty.
    We can do something about it one child at a time by refocusing our priorities on what matters. What matters is our responsibility to the children and the possibilities for the future.
    What we know for sure is…the children are the future.

>    I’ve raised more than one stray cat in my life and learned a thing or two from those experiences. Perhaps the most important lesson ever was triggered by an observation my husband made yesterday and the answer I gave. He noted how Sprout, a kitten we had taken in shortly after birth and Dave, a truly feral cat, had both come to trust humans over time and yet how Ellie, another stray, had never stopped living in fear, although she had spent 15+ years lovingly cared for by our family.
    Ellie walks with a severe limp and cowers from the slightest touch as a result of having been abused as a kitten. It’s also the point of origin for her fear of humans, and, as I call it, her “default mode” for seeing the world as a hurtful and dangerous place. I told my husband that was the difference between Sprout, Dave and Ellie. Sprout and Dave had first encounters with humans that were not burdened by pain. Ellie was not so blessed.
    I think we humans are no different.
    Each of us was born knowing little of the world we encountered with our first breath. So much depended on the welcome. Not just in those first moments, but well beyond into the ensuing years as we fell and stumbled our way through the early stages of childhood. How many of us were greeted and guided as Sprout and Dave were…and how many as Ellie?
    I don’t mean to say that if we are not lovingly cared for then we are necessarily abused (although that could probably be a blog in itself.) What I mean to say is that we are all born Dreamers with an Artist tucked away inside.
    We come into this world with boundless wonder knowing only limitless possibility. Too quickly, I think, we are taught the boundaries of wonder and the limitations around possibility. We are encouraged to fit rather than explore; to conform rather than create; to settle rather than wander. Dreams cannot flourish and mature in constricted places. They need to be unfettered and unrestrained and have the luxury of limitless expansiveness. Lacking that, they lose vital energy, wither and, ultimately, die.
    You might think that’s the saddest part. But it’s not. For it’s the Dreamer who finds it’s way to the Artist within. Without the Dreamer, the Artist will never be birthed.
    Each of us comes into the world with a purpose that is our own artistic contribution to the co-creative process. It is our Soul/sole purpose in being Here.
    Ellie is quite old and, sadly, dying. It’s too late for her to have lived a life other than the one she has lived. We humans are more fortunate. At any moment, while still Here, we can call forth the Dreamer of long ago and begin the search for the Artist within.
    There are no guarantees. We may or may not succeed in birthing the Artist. Ah, but to live the life of the Dreamer!
    “Not all that glitters is gold. Not all who wander are lost.”
    Now, there’s a welcome sign I’d like to see at every birth.

>    As we live through challenging times, and often turn to the lives of celebrities to distract us from more pressing matters, I’d like to clear up two misperceptions. 1) The lives of famous people are easier than ours, and 2) We are bound by the life circumstances we are now living.
    I think much of the fascination with the lives of the rich and famous is the illusion that they somehow have it better or easier and, therefore, don’t have to face the mundane matters or difficult decisions we do. That’s simply not true. No one, regardless of fame, wealth or social status gets to circumvent the “why” of why we’re here.
    We’re here to grow through our weaknesses and expand upon our strengths. The fact is everyone has them. Of course, mine are different than yours. However, each of us will have countless opportunities, by way of life choices and life experiences, to overcome our weaknesses and apply our strengths for the highest good.    
    What we do in idealizing the rich or famous is to elevate them to an artificial status that simply doesn’t exist, while negating the purposefulness inherent in our own lives.
    The other reason I think we tend to overindulge in such distraction is that we also misperceive our own life situations as somehow stagnant or, at least, too difficult to change. We get into life patterns that do not suit our true nature and yet, feel trapped by the very circumstances we’ve created through choice.
    Changing our circumstances is possible but requires a certain amount of honesty with oneself.
    First, it requires that we acknowledge responsibility for the choices we have made that resulted in the life situations in which we find ourselves. Secondly, it requires that in those situations where we seem not to have made a choice, but instead find ourselves in less-than-desireable conditions, we adjust how we perceive those conditions. For how we see things makes all the difference in both what we see as well as how we experience it. I am often reminded of the book by Holocaust survivor Viktor Frankl, in which he writes about the importance of bringing meaning in one’s experiences (as in the suffering and degrading conditions of concentration camp internment) and how such meaning can literally make the difference between life and death.
    There is no real benefit to wasting precious time lost in someone else’s life…whether it’s Britney Spears, O. J. Simpson, or your best friend.  Each of us is gifted a finite amount of time in these bodies to experience the world in our own unique way and, by so doing, bring added meaning to existence.
    Today, take the time and energy you might otherwise spend on someone else’s life script and apply it to your own. Take responsibility for the decisions you have made, realize you can see it all differently any time you choose, and them make today’s decisions fully conscious of their importance.
    In case you’ve forgotten, you are directing, editing and starring in this production.
   

>    I will admit at the outset that I have aways been more of a mystic than a religious person, although I was born and raised in Conservative Judaism. My father, a financially active member of our synagogue, did a yeoman’s job in raising a substantial amount of money to build the synagogue’s Frank Lloyd Wright designed new building. Shortly thereafter, he forever abandoned his synagogue attendance (except for weddings and funerals) when the synagogue began charging for High Holy Day seats by location…most expensive seats closest to the bima (stage) and decreasing in price as distance from it increased. He also had a minor problem with a neighbor who walked to synagogue on the Sabbath in strict observance of the prohibition not to drive, but who was less than ethical the other 6 days of the week in business.
    I grew up pursuing my own spiritual journey. I explored, intellectually, several religions while ultimately gravitating back toward mild Jewish observance as a single woman in my early thirties. When I married a non-Jew in my early 40’s, my husband later converted to Judaism (of his own accord) and he…then we…became Orthodox in observance. After several years his Orthodoxy waned as did mine. Today, we attend synagogue as a family on High Holy Days, mainly as continuity for our daughter’s sake.
    Personally, I remain the mystic I have always been. Which brings me to this week.
    It’s Rosh Hashana, the Jewish New Year, and the 10 days of Repentance, culminating in Yom Kippur. In Torah (the Five Books of Moses) Rosh Hashanah is a “one day” holy day. Outside of Israel, it has been for centuries, a “two-day” holy day, mandated by Rabbinic law, not Torah law (there’s a lot of that in Judaism). This year I observed the first day of Rosh Hashana but not the second.
    So it came to be that on the 2nd day of Rosh Hashana I was driving home from food shopping when I passed by the synagogue as it was ending morning services. As I watched the congregants walking either to their cars or walking home, I experienced a twinge of guilt for where I was as opposed to, perhaps, where I should have been. But as I continued to look at all the men and women exiting the building, I was struck by how similarly all the women were dressed and how similarly all the men were dressed. It occurred to me that so many people follow what they are taught, and what they see, without ever questioning why.
    And I was reminded of how important intention is to prayer.
    In Judaism, intent is called kavanah. It’s the sincerity and focused intention one brings to the effort to connect with the Divine. Without kavanah, prayer is pretty much an exercise in futility. When we proceed on a spiritual path simply, or primarily, because others before us have proceeded upon that path, without questioning why or whether it rings true within our own hearts, we are abdicating our uniqueness and the role each of us plays in reuniting the world in Oneness. It may be that a well worn path can serve us on or journey, but it may be equally true that it may not.
    The true spiritual path leads inward. It is a solitary journey that requires kavanah…focused, joyful intention…no matter what path you choose. Lacking that, one defaults to the status of “imitator” who blindly follows the group up ahead, regardless of whether or not they are heading in your direction.
    There are  many paths to Oneness. A connection to the Divine is not the sole prerogative of any one of those paths. When the connection is made, it’s unmistakable, whether it’s your own or that of another.
    The first day of Rosh Hashanah, as I sat in services, two young Orthodox men assisting with the formalities of the service were truly ecstatic in their devotion and joy. They were both inspiring and magnificent to watch. Their connection through their chosen path was undeniable. While their path is not mine, I delighted in being able to witness their experience. I have such moments myself walking in the woods listening to the Divine in Nature.
    Imagine if each of us could likewise both allow and celebrate the diverse paths that are available as ways to connect with God.  We’d likely be too busy being ecstatic and joyful to have much time (or desire) for judgment and separation…the two most commonly traveled paths to war.
    L’Shana tova. May you be inscribed in the Book of Life for a year of health, prosperity and peace.

>    Luciano Pavarotti, the gifted tenor, died yesterday. Seven years ago today my Father died. I am thinking about how we honor those who impact our lives when they are no longer with us in body. It may seem a little strange, but I learned how to do that from a dog I once loved. His name was Link.
    Link had a sense of humor (really!) and a seemingly boundless zest for life. He liked to do silly things that made me laugh out loud. When he was about 4 years old I was going through a tough time in my life. We went out for a walk one day and, lost in my own sadness, I turned my attention from watching him to feeling sorry for myself. In that instant, he bounded across the street, was hit by a speeding car and died in my lap on the way to the vet. I was devastated.
    In order to bring meaning to it all, I realized that Link had been an example of living each moment full of joy and heightened energy. Unable to teach me that in life, I learned it from him in death.
    The way to honor is by taking the best of what someone has brought to the world and live it.
    My Father was a strong-willed, self-made entrepreneur who was usually only available for family in a crisis. But he had a heart “as big as Texas” and a charitable nature that was remarkable. No matter how he came to know about a story of suffering or lack, he set about to try and do something to alleviate it. All the dictionaries in our home had the word “can’t” crossed out. My Father said there was no such word as “can’t” if you really wanted to do something. When he passed away, I spoke about his charitable nature as a way for his spirit to live on.
    I didn’t know Luciano Pavarotti…other than what I’ve read about him. But it seems to me he found the creative gift that made him the unique individual he was and embraced it, and life, with passion. It’s a wonderful teaching.
    All of the things that happen to us in our lives have no independent meaning other than what we attribute to them.
    I could have spent my life regretting that day I turned my eyes from watching Link and remained bitter for the times my Father was unavailable. Instead, I carry a permanent smile in my heart for Link’s joyful zest for life and try and emulate my Father’s will to uplift and prevail no matter what.
    As for Pavarotti, he will always be for me a guiding light for embracing my unique creative gift. I am a writer.
    Like all writers periodically do, I had recently been questioning and doubting my talent and whether or not it’s all “worth it.”  My gratitude to Pavarotti for reminding me how to honor a life and bring meaning to it. I have once again embraced my love of writing.
    Today, this blog was written solely because of the meaning Luciano Pavarotti’s life has brought to mine.

>    I am just returning from a 10 day vacation and notice that the reported news is bleak…still. Hurricanes, terrorists, a U.S. Senator lacking personal ethics and a national football player lacking common sense and respect for life. Pretty much the usual fare. How to cope with all this negativity and stress remains one of the most important questions of our time… so I’d like to share a possible method for dealing with it.
    Thousands of years ago Buddha suggested that our suffering originates from the mis-perception of who we really are and our resulting separation from all things when, in fact, separation does not exist. Judaism has an equally liberating thought passed down through its mystic tradition of Hasidism that says every word we speak creates movement in the world of matter. I think the blending of these two views of how we use our Consciousness provide an excellent pathway for “right” living in difficult times.
    According to Buddha, when we see a reflection in a mirror we forget that we are the mirror, not the reflection. Our tendency is to think we are the “stories” we repeat over and over about ourselves. “I am a lawyer”…”I am a mother”…”I can’t sleep at night”…”I’m not good at drawing”…”I gain weight easily”…”My work is boring”…”My brother and I can’t get along.”  These “stories” are how we define ourselves. Like the actress Marilyn Monroe, who lost who she really was to the character she created, we lose who we really are when we forget that all of our “stories” are just images passing in front of the mirror of our Consciousness. Who We Really Are is the Consciousness, not the images. The images are transitory. Consciousness is boundless and eternal.
    According to the Hasidic tradition, Rabbi Nachman said, “All thoughts of man are speaking movement, even when he does not know it.” So how and when we use our thoughts, and words…even the very words we choose to use, not only impacts our reality…they create it!
    Now if words create our world, and there is no separation, then what we say about ourselves and others forms the reality we personally live in but also forms the greater reality as well. 
    And if the stories we tell about ourselves and others are not who we are or who they are but simply transitory experiences passing in front of our collective Consciousness…then perhaps we need to think less, talk less and feel more.
    In both thought and speech, our ego has its greatest power. Ego is nourished by separation. It’s sustenance is derived from self-importance. When we move out of our minds and into our hearts, our feeling centers, we are able to step outside of ourselves and our ego to connect with others through identification and compassion
    The “stories” that we are fed daily about natural disasters and terrorists and Senators and football players are just transitory images passing in front of the mirror of our Consciousness. Let’s not get frozen in those images and forget who we really are.
    Who We Really Are is a fragment of the whole spectrum of possibility that exists anew each and every second of existence.
    When you sit with that thought and really feel it…all those stories we tell, and are told, get really small.

>    In yesterday’s blog, I wrote about personal responsibility. I thought that was the end of the topic, for now. I was wrong. Today’s CNN’s on-line, headline story has a photo Bob Murray, CEO of Murray Energy saying, “I’ll never come back to that evil mountain.”
    Mr. Murray is, of course, referring to the Utah mountain under which 6 miners have been trapped for over a week and where 3 rescue workers have been killed trying to find them. Murray has given anthropomorphic status to the mountain, as well as Free Will, and thereby exonerated…or at least assuaged his conscience and himself from any responsibility for the tragedy.
    Not that I’m looking to cast blame or guilt. Not even gross negligence (and I’m a former lawyer!). It’s just that in following this unfolding and very sad story, I read a few days ago that the method/technique used by Murray Energy to extract coal from that mountain is so dangerous that many mine companies nationwide no longer use it.  I’d like to ask Mr. Murray why his company was still using it. I think it’s a reasonable, and highly relevant, question.
    Now I know pursuit of this line of questioning will be more tedious for Mr. Murray and not nearly as compassion generating. The photo of him on CNN is that of an anguished man. This line of questioning will also likely involve a team of my former colleagues digging into business practices and safety standards. Fortunately, I no longer do that work and the job will fall to others.
    What I do now is write about the highest good for all concerned and how we, as contributors to the ever-unfolding and consciousness expanding Universe, can make contributions that positively impact our world.
    Mr. Murray’s statement about the mountain provides us a good opportunity to examine how we abdicate personal responsibility.
    What happened in Utah was not the mountain’s fault. At least not directly and consciously. If you believe that Nature takes care of itself and that it is capable of “retaliating” for damage done to it, then perhaps there is enough responsibility to go around afterall.
    More likely is the fact that we get back that which we put out. We are in wanton pursuit of extracting coal from the Earth without true respect and honor for either the Earth or the people we employ to do the job. We are using methods that are darn near antiquated and, I’d say, primitive in the scheme of things.
    With all the technological advances and all the intelligence in this country, it’s hard to believe that we have not yet developed alternative sources of energy sufficient to provide for the general good. It’s hard to believe that after thousands of years…it’s still all about the money.
    Let’s return to Mr. Murray and Murray Energy. He needs to say that he made a good financial decision and a bad human one. He needs to take responsibility for the method his company was pursuing and why. He needs to reevaluate his role as CEO at Murray Energy and how he sees it going forward…for himself and for the company. He needs to place value where it belongs…not on bottom line profits but on the sanctity of human life. He needs to step up so that all the children looking at all the people in positions of power begin to understand that we as a nation take personal responsibility for what we say and do.
    We are trapped in a pattern of ignoring our obligation to the integrity of every moment and every situation. The Bob Murray’s of this world can set an example of how to break that pattern and create a new one that better serves us all.
    Then none of us will be trapped anymore.
   

>    The American Medical Association met last month for it’s annual convention and considered, among other things, classifying “technology addiction” as a real mental disorder. I would characterize over-dependence and over-involvement with technology somewhat differently.  I’d call it “Abdication of Personal Responsibility Leading to Severe Energy Imbalance.”
    I know it’s a mouthful but it’s really quite simple.
    The internet is no different than a Big Mac…or in my case chocolate seven-layer cake. There are things in this world that we really want and, in moderation, are just fine for us. Then there are those things that we want which, outside the bounds of reasoned participation, are simply not good for us. Knowing where those boundaries are is what personal responsibility is all about. 
    I belabor the obvious but maybe the obvious needs belaboring.
    If I eat a piece of chocolate cake because it tastes good and I want it, fine! If I eat 3 pieces of chocolate cake and an hour later go back for more, well…not so fine. It’s up to me to know where the point of reason turns the corner and becomes overindulgence. It’s certainly not the responsibility of the American Medical Association to define or treat the exercise (or lack of exercise) of my will power or my Free Will, for that matter. That’s why I have Free Will to begin with.
    That’s the “Personal Responsibility” explanation of my definition of technology addiction.
    The “Severe Energy Imbalance” explanation goes like this.
    Many years ago I was on assignment in Southern California for 3 months and lived in a rented, furnished apartment. I had no television. That simple fact changed my life forever. In those three months I learned the importance of, and the freedom in, not overexposing myself  to energies that interfere with the proper functioning of my own natural, energetic patterns.
    Like the Internet, television is unnatural. By that I mean that the frequency at which they transmit is not in alignment with Circadian (earth) rhythms or our own biological rhythms. Since everything is ultimately just energy vibrating at different rates of speed, it’s important not to overexpose yourself to energies that interrupt or distort your own rhythms. Technology is out of alignment with all natural rhythms and, when overexposed to those energies, we become out of balance.  In reality, overexposure causes us to begin to resonate more in alignment with those energies, which makes it increasingly harder for us to relate to Nature not to mention other human beings.
    When I lived in California without television, I spent more time outdoors, I jogged each morning, I read more, I interacted with people more. I was inner directed and more at peace. That feeling was so profound and so enjoyable it has never left me. To this day I watch virtually no television.
    I do, however, spend more and more time on the Internet, especially now that I write to my blog each day. And I am beginning to feel the adverse effects of it all. I now need to exercise some of that personal responsibility before I find my own energies severely imbalanced.
    Personal respobsibility and balance. That’s the ticket.
    The AMA did not come to any conclusion on this issue at their annual meeting. They have tabled it for now.  I hope for all their sakes they don’t spend too much time between now and their next annual meeting on their computers going back and forth over this issue.
    Otherwise, they might find themselves with what they would call “a real mental disorder.”
   
   
   

>    So much has been going on in my life this summer (not all of it intended) that I’ve reached a point of exhaustion. It’s a good time to think about “being” as opposed to “doing.”
    We are so action and accomplishment oriented in our society that we too often drive ourselves to the proverbial “edge” before acknowledging that sometimes it’s better to “just be” than to do anything at all.  I’m reminded of a scene from the Kevin Costner movie “Bull Durham” when, at the end of movie, Costner returns to his love, Maggie (played by Susan Sarandon)and finally express his love for her. Maggie goes into a stream of consciousness monologue about how she can change and what the relationship means to her when Costner interrupts and says, “That’s all fine. And we’ll get to all of it. But right now, I just want to be.” The next scene, and the last one in the movie, is a no-dialog shot of the two of them joyously, freestyle dancing in her living room.
    That’s what we don’t give ourselves enough of.
    Not so much silence and freestyle dancing as permission to just be.
    Just being is about truly feeling our inherent self-worth whether or not we make money or win a competition or excel in school or have a mate. It’s about honoring the temple that houses our Soul and slowing down enough to see and hear and smell the beauty in everything around us no matter where we are.
    In his book, Man’s Search For Meaning, Ph.D. and Holocaust survivor Viktor Frankl writes that when served dirty water with a floating fish head in it as the only meal of the day in the Concentration Camp, he was able “to see beauty in the floating fish head.”  Surely his circumstances had so brought him to the present moment and the value of not only the moment but everything around him that he learned this invaluable lesson. Through his writing, he has tried to impart that lesson to us.
    I oftentimes refer to Frankl’s quote when speaking to audiences or coaching one-on-one. But today I think I need to live it. 
    I am very tired (as I started out saying in this entry) and have many things that need my attention. I could keep busy the rest of the day just tending to a fraction of them.
    Instead, I think I’ll close now, go pick up the book I’m reading, and lay down on the couch. Maybe I’ll even fall asleep.
    Regardless, I’m going to love and value myself even though I’m not going to achieve anything more than resting…honoring the temple that houses my Soul.