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for January, 2010.
By Gwen
Someone asked us recently, “Is there any limitation to the body’s ability to heal?” And we said, “None other than the belief that you hold.” And he said, “Then why aren’t people growing new limbs?” And we said, “Because no one believes that they can.”
— Abraham
Can you believe it?
On Oprah awhile back I watched an episode with Dr. Oz and they interviewed a 69 year old man whose fingertip had grown back by using a powder called pixie dust. Apparently his brother is a researcher who developed it by experimenting with cells extracted from pig intestines, which were dried up and made into a powder which when applied to the wound supplied the raw material for the wound to regenerate the tissue neccessary for healing to take place. AMAZING!!! If he can do THAT, just imagine what YOU can do with an ENCORE career!
Gwen
http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2009/03/oprah-show-dr-oz-explores-and-explains.html
By Gwen
At age 52, the words of The Desiderata , below, are much more powerful and full of meaning for me than when Michelle Varley (are you out there, Michelle?) memorized them and wrote them in calligraphy on construction paper to mount on the classroom wall in 7th grade. But even at that young age, the words grabbed me. I hope they grab you too! And please note at the bottom, the age of the author when he became a writer and wrote this wonderful verse. Thanks Michelle!
Gwen
The Desiderata
Go placidly amid the noise and haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence.
As far as possible, without surrender, be on good terms with all persons.
Speak your truth quietly and clearly; and listen to others, even to the dull and ignorant; they too have their story.
Avoid loud and aggressive persons; they are vexations to the spirit.
If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain or bitter, for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.
Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans.
Keep interested in your own career, however humble, it’s a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.
Exercise caution in your business affairs, for the world is full of trickery. But let this not blind you to what virtue there is; many persons strive for high ideals, and everywhere life is full of heroism.
Be yourself. Especially do not feign affection.
Neither be cynical about love; for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment, it is as perennial as the grass.
Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth.
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune.
But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings. Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.
Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself.
You are a child of the universe no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here.
And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should. Therefore be at peace with God, whatever you conceive him to be.
And whatever your labors and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life, keep peace in your soul.
With all its sham, drudgery and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world.
Be cheerful. Strive to be happy.
The Desiderata (Latin for Desired things) is a wonderful verse by Max Ehrmann (1872-1945) and considered by many to be the ideal philosophy of life. Ehrmann studied law and received a degree in philosophy from Harvard after which he worked as a lawyer and then in his families overalls manufacturing business. At the age of 41 he put it all aside and decided to be a writer. He wrote The Desiderata when he was 55 years of age.
By Gwen
Maslow said that in any given moment we have two options: to step forward into growth or to step back into safety.
I loved Abraham Maslow in college and his views on the hierarchy of needs and self actualization, however, I love him even more now since I’ve become an “official” Life Coach. His beliefs re: self actualization match beautifully with mine re: discovering our dharma. I believe that the following exercise is very powerful and I encourage you to really absorb the meaning. It can make all the difference in your life.
Gwen
We wake up in the morning. Is our first act a step forward (we get up immediately; we begin our first thoughts with appreciation for being alive) or do we step back into safety (stay in bed; hit snooze; etc.)?
You get a “plus 1″ if you stepped forward. a “minus 1″ one if you stepped backward.
Ok, so after that first act/thought, you’re either at “plus 1″ or a “minus 1.”
How about the next moment? Forward or back? The next…Forward or back? Forward or back? Moment to moment to moment…
Fast forward to the end of the day. Where are you? Plus 25,000 or minus 25,000?
Pay attention cuz the weight of those negative #s is going to make it hard for you to sleep well. In fact, why do you think people crack open the beer/turn on the TV/yell at the spouse and kids and generally act like a weenie too often at the end of a day?
Exactly. Too many steps in the wrong direction. Their soul knows that they were capable of soooo much more. Unfortunately, rather than address it thru more constructive behavior, way too often we take it out on others and blame/criticize/etc. Ick.
The quickest way to live a life of bliss? Step forward.
Philosophers Notes
Brian Johnson
http://www.philosophersnotes.com/
By Gwen
Do you ever think that you aren’t making any progress in your own personal growth? Well, I got this about 30 (ahem!) years ago when I was a low income single mom and a participant with a wonderful organization called Project Self Sufficiency in Everett, WA. It made such a HUGE impact on me that I made several copies and kept them in my file cabinet. Everytime someone would come to our house and we would start a conversation about feeling stuck or how sometimes in life it feels like you just keep falling in the same ol hole, I’d dash to my trusty file cabinet and pull out a copy for them! (See how long I’ve been “coaching” women?? LOL!) I don’t think I’ve ever met any woman who didn’t relate! I hope it helps you to see your own progress!
Gwen
Autobiography… in 5 short chapters
Chapter 1: I walk down the street. There is a deep hole in the sidewalk. I fall in… I am lost… I am helpless… It isn’t my fault. It takes forever to find my way out.
Chapter 2: I walk down the same street. There is a deep hole in the sidewalk. I pretend I don’t see it. I fall in again. I can’t believe I’m in the same place. But it isn’t my fault. It still takes a long time to get out.
Chapter 3: I walk down the same street. There is a deep hole in the sidewalk. I see it is there. I still fall in… it’s a habit… But, my eyes are open. I know where I am. It is my fault, my responsibility. I get out immediately.
Chapter 4: I walk down the same street. There is a deep hole in the sidewalk. I walk around it.
Chapter 5: I walk down another street.
–Author unknown
By Gwen
You experience what you believe. If you don’t believe that you experience what you believe,
then you don’t, which still means the first statement is true.
We may believe that what we experience will surprise us, which then it usually does. We may believe
the experience will enlighten us, which then it probably will. We may believe we will have to look long
and hard to find the experience. We may believe we will never find the experience. We may believe
there is no experience to find. We may believe there is nothing we can do about it, even if we find the
experience. We may believe the experience we find is not the experience we believed we would find.
We may believe anything we please, and when we decide to believe it without doubt, it is what we will
experience as reality.
Harry Palmer
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By Gwen
Abraham Maslow, a 20th century humanistic psychologist to whom we owe thanks for the advent of the modern trend in Positive Psychology, Maslow coined the phrase “the self-actualizing individual” and developed his framework of a “hierarchy of needs.” He says that our hierarchy of needs begins with the most basic physiological needs such as water, air, food and sleep. Then moving up the ladder the next level of needs include: security – desire for shelter from the environment, desire for steady employment, health insurance and safe neighborhoods. As we continuing climbing the next level of needs include social belonging, love and affection. Once our basic needs are met then we strive for esteem – self esteem, personal worth, social recognition and accomplishment. At the top of the hierarchy, according to Maslow, falls self actualization — personal growth and fulfilling our potential. His quote: “What one can be, one must be!” captures my thoughts and beliefs beautifully about dharma and life purpose, and that we must let our inner light shine.
Gwen
According to Maslow, we all have a NEED to self-actualize—to live at our highest potential and to express our latent potentialities. If we don’t fulfill this need, it’s like depriving our soul of oxygen. Although we might not gasp as noticeably as we would if our more basic need of physical oxygen were deprived, we WILL experience equally (albeit more subtly) painful symptoms of angst, anxiety, depression and all that (which, of course, are often medicated with pills, TV, alcohol, complaining, asinine conversations, etc.)
In his book, “Motivation and Personality” Maslow discusses self actualizing People in the following paragraph:
“Musicians must make music, artists must paint, poets must write if they are to be ultimately at peace with themselves. What human beings can be, they must be. They must be true to their own nature. This need we may call self-actualization… It refers to man’s desire for self-fulfillment, namely to the tendency for him to become actually in what he is potentially: to become everything one is capable of becoming.”
Maslow believed that the need to grow, to reach our potential, and to self-actualize is an absolutely fundamental need. This need to actualize is not a “wish” or a “desire” or a “sure would be nice to have” kind of thing. It’s a NEED (like that need we have for oxygen).
To the extent that we’ve taken care of our more basic needs and we’re not satisfying this need to self-actualize, we’re gonna live with anxiety, regret and disillusionment. Period. The specific manifestation of our self-actualizing process is obviously unique and varies greatly from person to person. As Maslow points out, in one individual it may “take the form of the desire to be an excellent parent, in another it may be expressed athletically, and in still another it may be expressed in painting pictures or in inventing things.”
However, in all cases, the question remains: What must you be?
Philosopher’s Notes
Brian Johnson
http://www.philosophersnotes.com/
By Gwen
Get in the game. Consider a situation or project you’ve wanted to start. Whatever you’ve been waiting for, forget it. Begin now from wherever you are with whatever you’ve got. If possible, do it while working for or with someone else, first, to learn the ropes. If you’ve already learned, no more excuses. Go for it!
Practice optimism. Today, whatever anyone says is a problem or an obstacle, reframe it into an opportunity. You’ll drive negative people nuts, but, hey, what’s the difference? That’s what they’re constantly doing to themselves anyway!
Focus on what you have, not on what you don’t have. Make a list of 10 things you are grateful for in your life and read the list aloud. Then read it each morning for the next 30 days. If you don’t appreciate what you’ve got, you won’t get any more and you don’t need any more.
T Harv Eckert
Secrets of The Millionaire Mind
When I attended a 3 day training by T Harv Eckert several years ago I finally realized that I was singlehandedly the one holding myself back from my own financial success. “What? That’s absolutely crazy! Why would I do that to myself?,” I thought. However, now I understand deep down that once we really accept that we are the ones completely in charge of our own destiny, then we have a fair shot at doing something about it! If we stay victims and blame others for our plight… regarding money or anything else, then I believe we are truly stuck.
Gwen
By Gwen
Every time I go back to my “natural” tendency to try harder…struggle… I’m reminded of the first chapter in one of my favorite books, YOU 2, by Price Pritchett. I say my “natural” tendency because that’s what I was programmed as a young child to do, and I did it diligently, without ever being awake enough to see what I was doing to myself. Try harder. I’ve spent much of my life doing just that. I thought that by shear force of will I could reach my goals. Hmm…and I kept burning myself out. I slowly started to realize that “trying harder” isn’t necessarily the solution to achieving more.
Gwen
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I’m sitting in a quiet room at the Millcroft Inn, a peaceful little place hidden back among the pine trees about an hour out of Toronto. It’s just past noon, late July, and I’m listening to the desperate sounds of a life-or-death struggle going on a few feet away.
There’s a small fly burning out the last of it’s short life’s energies in a futile attempt to fly through the glass of the windowpane. The whining wings tell the poignant story of the fly’s strategy – try harder.
But it’s not working.
The frenzied effort offers no hope for survival. Ironically, the struggle is part of the trap. It is impossible for the fly to try hard enough to succeed at breaking through the glass. Nevertheless, this little insect has staked its life on reaching its goal through raw effort and determination.
This fly is doomed. It will die there on the windowsill.
Across the room, ten steps away, the door is open. Ten seconds of flying time and this small creature could reach the outside world it seeks. With only a fraction of the effort now being wasted, it could be free of this self-imposed trap. The breakthrough possibility is there. It would be so easy.
Why doesn’t the fly try another approach, something dramatically different? How did it get so locked in on the idea that this particular route, and determined effort, offer the most promise for success? What logic is there in continuing, until death, to seek a breakthrough with “more of the same”?
No doubt this approach makes sense to the fly. Regrettably, it’s an idea that will kill.
“Trying harder” isn’t necessarily the solution to achieving more. It may not offer any real promise for getting what you want out of life. Sometimes, in fact, it’s a big part of the problem.
If you stake your hopes for a breakthrough on trying harder than ever, you may kill your chances for success.
Price Pritchett
YOU 2
By Gwen
It’s not the date you were born, or the date you died, that really matters.
It’s “the dash” between those years, and what you do with it, to make a difference with your life.
The story behind The Dash,
by Linda Ellis
While it still amazes me, a simple poem I wrote one afternoon forever changed my life. It all began when I faxed a copy of this poem to a syndicated radio show in Atlanta. Soon after receiving it, the host of this popular show read it on the air. Little did I know how much my life would change from that day forward. Titled The Dash, these 36 lines have touched millions of lives and have literally taken on a life of their own by traveling all over the world. I call it uncomplicated poetry in a complicated world.
People are always asking me what, in particular, inspired me to write this poem. I believe it was a combination of things in my life at the time. It was during a period when I was working for the top executives of a very large and successful corporation. It was a strict company with a tense working environment.
I began to watch how the priorities in many lives there had become misaligned. It seemed to me that the bosses were worrying far too much about that which was inconsequential in the scope of life.
Also, resonating in the back of my mind were the words from a letter which had been previously routed around the office. It had been written by the wife of an employee who was aware that she was dying. I was so moved by that letter that I saved a copy of it and continue to live by her words:
Regrets? I have a few. Too much worrying. I worried about finding the right husband and having children, being on time, being late and so on. It didn’t matter. It all works out and it would have worked out without the worries and the tears.
If I would have only known then what I know now. But, I did and so do you. We’re all going to die. Stop worrying and start loving and living.
Her words stuck with me. Her letter made me stop and think. This is it. This is all we get.
I remember where I was when I first truly realized the significance of the piece that I had written. I was on a business trip in Minnesota, alone in a hotel room. I received an emotional email thanking me for sharing the message of the Dash from a student who had recently heard it as part of a memorial gathering for the Columbine High School students. I sat on the bed and cried.
Several years later, I found myself engulfed in the thoughts and feelings created by my own words as I listened to them read aloud, for what seemed like the very first time, at the funeral of my father…my best friend.
From being performed in an elementary school play somewhere in the heartland of America to being part of a State Supreme Court Justice’s speech, from being printed in best-selling novels to high school yearbooks, The Dash has truly affected millions. I may not be able to change the world with these words, but I have certainly been able to influence a portion of it! The poem’s words have convinced mothers to spend more time with their children, fathers to spend more time at home, and reunited long-lost loved ones.
The words have changed attitudes, and changed the direction of lives. They have, in their own way, made a difference. I know writing The Dash has changed my life. I hope reading it, in some way, may change yours.
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Happy Martin Luther King Jr. day! As I’m writing this I’m remembering the phenominal “I Have a Dream” speech and I’m thinking that the two tie in well together. I hope you enjoyed this as much as I did and I hope it’s a reminder that you are completely in charge of how you experience The Dash in your life — starting today!
Gwen
By Gwen
The mental labels of “good” or “bad” are ultimately illusory. They always imply a limited perspective and so are true only relatively and temporarily. This is illustrated in a story of a wise man who won an expensive car in a lottery. His friends and family were very happy for him and came to celebrate. “Isn’t it great!” they said. “You are so lucky.” The man smiled and said, “Maybe.” For a few weeks he enjoyed driving the car. Then one day a drunken driver crashed into his new car at an intersection and he ended up in the hospital, with multiple injuries. His friends and family came to see him and said, “That was really unfortunate.” Again the man smiled and said, “Maybe.” While he was still in the hospital, one night there was a landslide and his house fell into the sea. Again his friends and family came the next day and said, “Weren’t you lucky to have been here in the hospital.” Again, he said “Maybe.”
The wise man’s “maybe” signifies a refusal to judge anything that happens. Instead of judging what is, he accepts it and so enters into conscious alignment with the higher order. He knows that often it is impossible for the mind to understand what place or purpose a seemingly random event has in the tapestry of the whole.
Eckert Tolle
A New Earth
This particular story brought me back to my early days of trying to make sense of the world and begining to learn about how we all have individual unique personalities. When I was 17, a co-worker introduced me to the world of astrology. I learned that by virtue of having a birthday in the month of October, I was a Libra, the balance. According to the astrology books when you are a Libra you have the natural ability to see both sides of a situation. Hmm…I’ve always seemed to have that ability so I was sold!
I understand that most likely astrology wasn’t what was in Eckert Tolle’s mind when he wrote his book The New Earth, however, if you are able to take a look at a situation from both sides, and stay in the now, you are less likely to get stuck in the judgment of the past or the future.
Gwen
"When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change."