To love is to risk not being loved in return. To hope is to risk pain. To try is to risk failure, but risk must be taken because the greatest hazard in life is to risk nothing.
— Anonymous
Recently I received the following story in an email. I don’t know who wrote it as it wasn’t attributed to anyone when I received it. If you know who wrote it, please let us know.
I dreamt that I went to Heaven and an angel was showing me around. We walked side-by-side inside a large workroom filled with angels. My angel guide stopped in front of the first section and said, “This is the Receiving Section. Here, all petitions to Continue reading » From Gratitude Comes Hope
There was no need to do any housework at all. After the first four years the dirt doesn’t get any worse.
— Quentin Crisp,
The Naked Civil Servant, 1968
Recently, a friend of this blog wrote on her blog that “A friend of mine and her partner contribute meaningful articles on their blog every day…and I do not mean comments like “well I guess I’ll sign off and start dusting!!!”
Well, not to be disrespectful, today I’d like to focus on “dusting.”
The reason for this is that despite the fact that housekeeping isn’t my #1 interest in life, I’ve spent a fair amount of the time that I’ve been working on clearing out my folks’ house trying to create spaces that are clean enough to “live-in” temporarily.
I’m the kind of person who likes to see the change when I clean. To some extent, I need Continue reading » Digging Out
It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare. It is because we do not dare that things are difficult.
— Seneca
Remember that commercial – “Is it real or is it Memorex?” They would usually have an opera singer hitting a really high note and breaking a glass and then play the recording of the singer and break another glass. It was a way to show the true fidelity of the recording.
I’ve been noticing how much we, as a society, have been talking about our troubles. Have you noticed? We talk about what bothers us more than we talk about what pleases us. There’s been a lot of conversation about how bad things are economically and how the Baby Boomers won’t have the retirement that they expected. It seems that we’re on a perpetual downer around here. The conclusion that I’ve reached is that somehow, we’ve decided that problems aren’t part of life, which is why we get soooo bent out of shape when a problem turns up.
I blame it on the Declaration of Independence. Continue reading » Is It Adversity or Is It Life?
No one ever finds life worth living – one has to make it worth living.
— Anonymous
A friend of mine is stuck. She has broken up with her partner but because he is working an hour’s plane ride away, she is waiting for him to return and get his things. Because two of those things are his cats, she feels that she can’t give notice on her apartment because no pets are allowed. She wants the cats out of there so that if the landlord wants to come and meet with her, there won’t be a problem because of the cats. Since she doesn’t know when he will come back, she can’t move forward and give notice.
Added to the general pain of the breakup, she is very attached to the cats and she is really going to miss them. She is in a lot of pain waiting for this to come to an end. She can’t keep him just for the cats and she can’t move on. She is truly stuck.
Ellie has been forced into a situation that she didn’t choose and can’t change. As we’ve watched Ellie move through her grief, one thing is abundantly clear Continue reading » Choosing Life
Getting over a painful experience is much like crossing monkey bars. You have to let go at some point in order to move forward.
— Unknown
For the recent holiday weekend I proclaimed myself a four-day-weekend and set about doing a myriad of tasks that used to be either “he or we” projects, never mine alone… I was busy, busy, busy. I was “letting go”.
Letting Go Ain’t for the Faint of Heart
Letting go takes a lot of work and determination. It’s MUCH easier to just let things be. But I knew that moving on, transitioning “from we to me”, required doing “what don’t come easy”… and I, not someone else, needed to do the choosing: keep or let go?
It Was a Close Call
There was a point when I despaired of ever making any decisions, I just couldn’t bear to let go of anything no matter what it was. So how’d I power through? Continue reading » Busy, Busy Days on the Way to Letting Go
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