I spoke a couple of days ago about the downfalls of being in a perpetual cycle of outrage about current events. I also promised some ways to step out of the storm and channel your valuable energy towards more productivity. Ways to tackle what is causing all the outrage but keeping yourself out of the fire.

Here are some ideas for you to get involved and start changing issues you don’t agree with to your desired outcome:

1. 5calls.org
   This site gives you 5 calls you can make in 5 minutes. You can make your voices heard. Turn your passive participation into active resistance. Facebook likes and Twitter retweets can’t create the change you want to see. Calling your Government on the phone can. Spend 5 minutes, make 5 calls. Calling is the most effective way to influence your representative. 5 Calls provides phone numbers and scripts so calling is quick and easy. It uses your location by zip code to find your local representatives so your calls have more impact
2. https://www.resistancemanual.org
   The Resistance Manual is an open source guide to taking action on a range of issues, from incarceration to immigration
3. https://www.runforsomething.net
   Run For Something is a website that helps young people get involved with leadership roles. It is a new political nonprofit founded by two veteran Democratic digital organizers to recruit progressive millennials to run for office.
4. nooneleft.org
   is a 501 (c)(3) organization dedicated to saving the lives of America’s Wartime Allies and their families who have saved the lives of thousands of Americans in service to our country. No one Left Behind is dedicated to helping obtain special immigration visas for those — like translators and interpreters — who have helped U. S. soldiers abroad.
5. www.marchforscience.com
   The March for Science will be held this year on Earth Day, April 22nd. Showing up is a way of saying that you care about facts, data, science and climate change.
6. www.indivisibleguide.com
   The Indivisible guide bills itself as a “practical guide to resisting the tRump agenda” and also shows you how to get involved with one of the 4,500 local indivisible groups that have already been started.
7. https://dailyaction.org/
   Daily Action, a daily text people can sign up for that gives them one concrete and specific action to take for that day.

So … Get busy. Make a difference and don’t be outraged…..be outrageous!

Onward and upward, DeeDee

All of these sites were pulled from the Arianna Huffington article I referenced in my last post.

My wise and wonderful flute instructor gave me an article to read a few weeks ago. It is by Arianna Huffington, founder of the Huffington Post. The article addresses living in a perpetual state of outrage in today’s political arena. Bottom line, if we live in this state, the other side wins.

Some people find themselves in a viscous cycle:
1. First thing in the morning, tuning on the television with your morning coffee to see what “they” did overnight,
2. checking your social media and email for the latest outrageous proposals and statements, and yes, TWEETS
3. looking at your cell phone for affirmations from your friends that assure you, “Yes, those people are crazy and mentally ill!”
4. ruining a perfectly wonderful dinner at a lovely restaurant by talking about the shit storm,
5. you return home and tune in again to the TV to see what else has happened,
6. you retire for an insomnia filled night after working yourself up into a tizzy
7. you get up in the morning and start the cycle all over again.

Rinse and repeat.

This is no way to live. Barely a month into this storm, we are already exhausted by it. And that is not healthy. Huffington says, “When we live in an ongoing state of outrage, anxiety, fear and stress, it wreaks an awful toll on our physical and mental health.” This state is not sustainable and why we have to take back control of how we react. If we are constantly depleted and exhausted, “we are not as resourceful, creative or effective”.

Just venting and complaining does not affect outcomes. We have to act from our inner strength and inner freedom. If we are robbed of this, we feel like victims. Whatever you do, don’t let yourself get stuck in this vicious, outrageous storm! This storm is going to be around longer than you want but do not succumb to it’s power. You have the power inside of you to step away from this storm so use it.

The best route we can take is to channel that energy and inner strength toward some positive and productive ways that can change outcomes.

Think of it this way, when we fight a disease the most important thing we do is take care of ourself and strengthen our resilience. We make sure we get enough sleep, sufficient exercise (both physically and mentally), eat healthy meals and TAKE A BREAK FROM TECHNOLOGY. Don’t start and end your day with the latest news.

Marcus Aurelius, Emperor of Rome for almost twenty years said, “There is nowhere that a person can find a more peaceful and trouble-free retreat than in his own mind … so constantly give yourself this retreat, and renew yourself.” 

It is so important to unplug and separate yourself from technology and just “be” and “breathe.” It is good for your brain.

DeeDee

P.S. Tomorrow I will list some ways others have chosen to channel their energy in promoting positive outcomes. Stay tuned.

In my ongoing attempt to fill in the grooves of any negative neural pathways I created in the past to maintaining new positive neural pathways, I stumbled onto something I adore! It is called “tiny slivers of joy”!

Chade-Meng Tan, known as “the jolly good fellow”, was a former engineer at Google. He helped build their mobile search function but is better known for his highly successful mindfulness* classes for employees.

He used to be a “pretty miserable guy” but in his early adulthood, found the path to being a much happier guy.Tan says that if you reshape your mindset with mental exercises you can add “thin slices of joy” to your everyday life. They occur in life everywhere!

Here’s an example, you are thirsty, you take a long cool drink of water. It tastes so good and in one or two seconds you have created your tiny slice of joy. It happens over and over throughout your day. You just have to take note. These slices add up throughout the day and the more you notice joy, the more you will experience joy. And once you start noticing it, you find that it is always there.

By looking for those slices of joy throughout your day, you are forming a new habit. The habit becomes natural and is automatic and it becomes easier to repeat that behavior without much thought.

Tan says these “slices” contain three parts — the trigger, a routine, and a reward. These are the three things required to build a habit. You have to train yourself to notice, what you don’t notice, you don’t see.

After reading and researching this concept, I have begun looking for those slivers of joy throughout my day. Yesterday driving home, I passed a pickup truck pulling a horse trailer with three horses inside. As I passed, all three horses stuck their heads out breathing in the passing air with their beautiful manes flowing in the breeze. I felt good all over just seeing this and said to myself, “Wow, that was my first tiny sliver of joy”

Start looking for and gathering yours. They are everywhere and there for the taking.

Joy to you, DeeDee

P.S. Tan latest book describes this concept, Joy on Demand

*Definition of mindfulness. 1 : the quality or state of being mindful. 2 : the practice of maintaining a nonjudgmental state of heightened or complete awareness of one’s thoughts, emotions, or experiences on a moment-to-moment basis; also : such a state of awareness.

I was baptized and raised as a Roman Catholic. I even went to 12 years of Catholic School, my high school years spent at an all-girl college preparatory. The thing is, all of the rituals and rules of the Catholic religion just never really “took” on me. I basically have a scientific mind wanting explanations and research on everything. The Catholic Religion’s teaching wasn’t supported by science and was just really illogical to me. So I got a really good private school education and survived all that doctrine that never, ever made sense to me.

My parents and the majority of my family on both my parent’s sides were Roman Catholic. My parent’s practiced it, raised us in it, but never pushed it. After we were 18, we got to decide on organized religion. Some of us chose it, some not. But what was so rewarding and completely understandable to me was “the golden rule”. That is the main doctrine they modeled and taught to their five children. The beauty of that is that this rule exists in all religions. What more simple way of living could you ask for than to simply, “do unto others as you would have them do unto you”! Right?

I began searching for this idea in other religions and want to share them with you right here:

Baha’i Faith: “Ascribe not to any soul that which thou wouldst not have ascribed to thee, and say not that which thou doest not.” “Blessed is he who preferreth his brother before himself.”

Brahmanism:  This is the sum of Dharma [duty]: Do naught unto others which would cause you pain if done to you. Mahabharata, 5:1517 ”

Buddhism:...a state that is not pleasing or delightful to me, how could I inflict that upon another?  Samyutta NIkaya v. 353

Christianity:  Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets.  Matthew 7:12, King James Version.

Confucianism: Do not do to others what you do not want them to do to you. Doctrine of the Mean

Ancient Egyptian: Do for one who may do for you, that you may cause him thus to do. The Tale of the Eloquent Peasant, 109 – 110 Translated by R.B. Parkinson.

Hinduism: This is the sum of duty: do not do to others what would cause pain if done to you. Mahabharata 5:1517

The religion of the Incas: Do not to another what you would not yourself experience. Manco Capoc, founder of the empire of Peru.

Islam: None of you [truly] believes until he wishes for his brother what he wishes for himself. Number 13 of Imam Al-Nawawi’s Forty Hadiths.

Jainism:  In happiness and suffering, in joy and grief, we should regard all creatures as we regard our own self. Lord Mahavira, 24th Tirthankara

In these difficult and somewhat confusing times, it is really the only rule we need. It takes care of a lot of problems both in us and the world.

I am far from perfect but have tried to follow in the footsteps of my parents by treating others the way I want to be treated. Sometimes I stumble and so did my parents. But … I try to catch myself, just as my parents did, and do something good to even out my karmic savings account! I never want to be overdrawn, the penalties are never worth it.

Namaste, DeeDee

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As a follower and supporter of eastern philosophies, I receive a daily thought from thedailybuddha.com. Today’s message really made me think. We all have a choice in our mindset. Do we have the scarcity mindset or the abundance mindset?

In our lives we can focus on what we have, count your blessings so to speak, or we can focus on scarcity — what we don’t have. You have to pick one. You can’t think of both at the same time. Try it. Doesn’t work.

Focusing on what we have is a quality abundance mindset. If we focus on what used to be, what we lost, or how hard and unfair live is then we have chosen the scarcity mindset. And here’s the rub. If you focus on the negatives then you will only get more negative. Why not choose abundance instead?

The scarcity mindset is scary to me. It just leads to more bad things — trying to control other people, severe competitiveness and other negative behaviors — which only ends in more unhappiness. If you are here, you need to shift your focus to positiveness and your life will switch to a more positive story.

The abundant mindset means seeing all your possibilities in the world. You can create, connect to people, and in the process grow and enjoy your life just as it is. Now admittedly, having it all would get boring and you wouldn’t appreciate anything you have at all. Abundance is not about having it all but instead just being happy with what you do have.

We are all presented with opportunities throughout our life and have the choice to go forward in a positive direction or sink back into a black hole. Choose light and abundance. The world is full of it. Just open your eyes and take a look.

I, for one, am thrilled to choose abundance. I am so happy for what I have. I don’t even need to go shopping. I have everything I need.

Sometimes when you think you need something, if you’d just look around, you probably already have it.

Abundance for all!

DeeDee

 

I used to love reading my newspapers — New York Times, Washington Post, Chicago Tribune and Huffpost — every morning and evening but no more. Now they are sources of nausea and depression for me. I just can’t read about all the negative, hateful, facts and alt-facts that are out there right now. I’ve had the blues for the last few days and figured out that it was the news that was messing with my physicality and psyche.

So? What to do? I decided to do a google search on “only good news” and came up with some great alt-news sites to frequent. For all the bad that’s going on in the world, there is plenty of good too.

Here are the websites I found and I hope you enjoy them as much as I am.

http://www.hooplaha.com/
https://www.positive.news/
http://www.sunnyskyz.com/good-news
http://www.dailygood.org/
http://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/

Feeling so much better now after visiting these sites. I will be avoiding mass media and social media until the coast is clear. It is not safe or healthy for me to subject myself to the daily ugliness. I would much rather be a positive, perpetual pollyanna….

As my Dad used to always say when we were sad as kids, “Let’s skip”. Okay, how fun is that!

I am a self-professed lexophile. Sounds serious, doesn’t it. Yep, serious lover of words. I love, love words and spend time learning new words every day. Vocabulary is such a wonderful tool. You can describe things in the most visual and fascinating way or express your exact feelings to someone and they get it.

When someone asks, “How are you today”, whether you are fine or not, you automatically and robotically say “Fine”. That doesn’t say anything about how you are. Why not say one of these affirmations:

I am accomplished
I am admirable
I am exceptional
I am fantastic
I am magnificent
I am outstanding

Or maybe that’s not how you feel at all. Maybe you are down or sad. Then you could answer truthfully and say some of these things:

I am woebegone
I am wistful
I am despondent
I am doleful
I am downcast
I am pensive

Then maybe again you are neither fine or down, you are just feeling mediocre. In that case you could answer with these phrases:

I am passable
I am tolerable
I am fairish
I am indifferent
I am colorless
I’m vanilla

I buy groceries at a small family owned store in my small town. The owner typically hires high School students as checkers. I always ask how they are and if they reply with “fine”, I won’t except it. I ask for a more descriptive word. Sometimes they come up with something else or ask me to share some words which I happily do. Now when they see me coming I know their brains are churning to come with any other word than “fine”.

I have a book, The Thinker’s Thesaurus: Sophisticated Alternatives to Common Words by Peter E. Meltzer. It is fascinatingly filled with words you’ve never heard of to replace those tired old words you’ve been using. I’m not certain I would use any of these but get a load of some synonyms for common words. They are crazy for sure and probably no one will understand if you use them:

fine: galumptious or skookum
fat: abdominous, avoirdupois, fubsy or pyknic
hungry: esurient or edacious
sad: tristful, chapfallen, dysthymic, plangent or saturnine

I told you they were crazy. It makes me remember when a while back I was taking the GRE test to enter Graduate School. The vocabulary section had words like these that you were supposed to define. I started crying at this point in the exam. Luckily I passed but it was a traumatic experience for someone who thought they had a broad vocabulary.

In my quest for yet more synonyms of common words, don’t be surprised if I try out some new ones on you and you have no idea what I am talking about.

You will most certainly think I am tetched!

Until next time, keep learning new words so you are not guilty of malaproprism.*

Clangorously, DeeDee

*malaproprism: Malapropisms differ from other kinds of speaking or writing mistakes, such as eggcorns or spoonerisms, and from the accidental or deliberate production of newly made-up words (neologisms).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We all know that “bad stuff happens” in our lives and we most certainly will instantly react to it. It can cause pain and suffering. It happens to me all the time and I used to get really upset for days. Then  I discovered what Radical Acceptance is all about.

Radical Acceptance is about accepting your life and not resisting what you can’t change. It is about saying yes to your life just as it is. Easy to say, not so easy to do.

You feel sadness and pain when something adverse happens. Suffering is what you do to yourself from the pain and the interpretation you put on your pain. Pain is not optional but suffering is. It is hard to accept what you don’t want to be true.

People may say, “I can’t believe this is happening” or “This isn’t fair”. It is almost like people think that not believing it will keep it from being true. They don’t want to accept it and think by accepting it they are agreeing with it.  It is extremely hard just to roll over and accept the pain but, I can tell you, it is far worse, not to do so. Not accepting doesn’t change the situation. It only adds to your pain and suffering.

This is part of my effort to “be real” and live an authentic life. It is exhausting to fight reality and it doesn’t work. Accepting reality is difficult when painful things happen in your life but these things are part of your life. When you try to resist those powerful emotions you are selling yourself short and only adding to the suffering. You might even make matters worse than they are by building it up in your mind and thoughts that are unrealistic. You can stop all this by practicing acceptance.

Our lives are filled with joy as well as pain. If you push away or don’t accept the pain, then your joy will be diminished because you still carry these negative emotions inside you. If you avoid your feelings of pain, it can cause even bigger problems such as depression and anxiety. It can even lead to self-destructive behavior such as using illegal substances or drinking alcohol. You might think that these actions help you avoid the pain but really you are only making the situation worse.

A way to accept life’s undesirable events is to just say, “Okay, I am in this. I am part of it. I don’t like it at all. But I can’t change what happened.” It is over. Putting yourself in extreme anxiety and a full blown frenzy is not going to make the traffic go away, make the light change, or get to where you are going sooner. It only makes you more upset. You are going to get there anyway, sooner or later and accepting it makes the ride easier. You are still disappointed but by not adding stress and worry to the situation it doesn’t get to the point where your head is about to blow up. Plus the added benefit is that you are practicing for acceptance when more upsetting things happen in your life.

We all have to experience loss of a loved one and may express disbelief. “I can’t believe they are gone”. Accepting it doesn’t mean you don’t feel pain but you will begin to heal immediately. Resisting reality will just delay the healing and add suffering to your pain.

Radical acceptance is not easy to practice and it took me about 8 months to change my thinking. I am so glad I did the work. I can now face any situation with acceptance, and yes some pain, but hardly any suffering. It is the suffering part we want to lose. When something adverse happens in my life, I just say to myself, “It’s over”, knowing I cannot change what happened and need to just move on.

I am mostly a happy, positive person but I want you to know that acceptance isn’t about always being positive, or optimistic, or glass half full. It is simply seeing things exactly how they are — even the shitty things — and just going forward. Acceptance is not feeling defeated or to avoid changes, it allows us to make these changes more effectively. We are not wasting our precious time and energy denying what is, or trying to change what happened.

Acceptance is nothing more than observation about the situation without judgement. It allows for a deeper and truer observation than you would have otherwise.

I’m still learning and sometimes when “shit happens”, it may take a few minutes, hours or days for my acceptance to kick in, but I can tell you, since I have been doing this, my life is more full of joy than I ever would have thought possible. Go for it!

DeeDee

Sources:

Linehan, M. Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy of Borderline Personality Disorder. New York: The Guilford Press, 1993

McCay, M., Wood, J. C., & Bentley, J. (2007) The dialectical behavior therapy skills workbook, Oakland, CA; New Harbinger Publications.

A few posts back I posted about the coming new year and how I planned on moving through it. I subscribe to thedailybuddha.com and each day I receive a meaningful message. Yesterday’s message was so right-on that I had to share it with you.

I think of myself as zig-zagging through life always moving forward but never in a straight line. Jim from thedailybuddha.com (He writes the daily messages but I couldn’t find any more information on him) summed up exactly how I feel about moving through life.

He says that as life moves forward some of us think we have to move along with it. And admittedly this is true to some degree. But maybe we want to sidestep a bit. We might come to a fork in the road and take it. We might be ready to just stop and take a break. Jim says, “Life is not a line even through we are conditioned to see it this way”. In reality our life follows a path that often twists and turns and although it can seem off course …. we are still moving forward.

So, forward doesn’t always mean straight ahead. You may decide to take the off road path rather than the superhighway. We don’t want to be in a rush to get to the end of our being.

Indeed, nothing in the definition of forward says it has to be in a straight line. Here’s Webster’s definition: forward; in the direction that one is facing or traveling; towards the front. So forward could mean you might have to backtrack, get sidetracked, circle around or just sit still for a little while.

Sometimes these diversions are annoying or frustrating. We don’t understand the blocked path. But I can tell you that in my experiences, some of my diversions from the straight line are my best memories, most knowledgable experiences and exhilarating, serendipitous happenings. When you backtrack, turn around or sidetrack you embark on a new adventure and will come back to the main path when it presents itself. Sometimes you might feel stuck in a situation but just take the time to understand why you are there. Jim Says, “Don’t avoid these moments but embrace them as lessons to learn, experiences to gather and wisdom to be found”. 

If we change how we feel about so called “obstacles” or “road blocks” along our journey, we can shift our attitude to search for meaning from the experience. I despise this saying but sometimes you have to say it. Things happen for a reason.

Enjoy the trip!

Namaste, DeeDee

 

The heading is a line from a country rock song that my husband’s band performed years ago. I always loved it and use it as one of my mantras to live my life. I couldn’t find the lyrics or the author of the song and these are the only words I remember, but it is enough. What else can you ask of yourself or others than to “be real”.

Being real is being authentic. Like many ways you might want to be, authenticity isn’t something you have or don’t have. It is a conscious choice of how you want to live your life. If you choose it, it is a way to just show up and be real. The choice to be honest and true. To let your true self be seen. Warts and all.

It isn’t necessarily an easy thing to be. On any given day we can sell ourselves out and be anybody people need us to be. That’s how I lived my first 25 years on the planet. I was so insecure in my own realness, that I could easily adapt and morph into whatever the situation called for. I was an Academy Award winning actress. It wasn’t until I sought psychotherapy at 25 that I found my true self and the art of living life being real and authentic. But like I said, it isn’t easy. I still can willfully slip into actress mode if I don’t want to be real in difficult situations.

I would say that most of us are drawn to authentic people and would aspire to be that way. However it is extremely difficult to be that way in our present culture of “fitting in” and “people pleasing”. We want to be or have what our culture praises as success. Choosing to be authentic can be comforting and exhausting all at the same time.

I like this definition of authenticity taken from the book The Gifts of Imperfection by author, Brene Brown: “Authenticity is the daily practice of letting go of who we thing we are supposed to be and just embracing who we are.”  We must cultivate the courage and strength to be less than perfect and to allow ourselves to be vulnerable.

This quote from E. E. Cummings about being real perfectly sums up what we are up against in just trying to be real: To be nobody but yourself in a world which is doing it’s best, night and day, to make you everybody but yourself — means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight — and never stop fighting. Being and staying real may be the hardest battle we ever encounter.

But, you might ask, how can we be authentic without sounding selfish or narcissistic? Here’s a few tips, again from the book, Gifts of Imperfection:
• Don’t make people feel uncomfortable but be honest.
• Don’t upset anyone or hurt anyone’s feelings but say what is on your mind.
• Sound informed and educated but not like a know-it-all.
• Don’t say anything unpopular or controversial but have the courage to disagree with the crowd.
In other words, be real, but don’t be mean or self-righteous!

It can feel unsafe to choose authenticity. In many cases being real over not being popular is dangerous territory. We have to step out of our warm and cozy comfort zone and have the strength to withstand the chance of getting knocked down.  And when people do strike out and attack or criticize us while we are speaking out, they are taking the easy way out. Cruelty is cheap and easy. It is also chicken-shit. Especially when you attack someone anonymously like technology allows us to do daily on social media. We have a choice. Just don’t go there. If you can’t say something nice and supportive, don’t say anything at all. Right?

Authenticity involves the risk of putting your true self out in the world. But really, isn’t it more risky to hide inside yourself and not deliver the knowledge you possess to insert new ideas or ways of thinking into another person’s brain?

According to Brene Brown, we should be born with a warning label that reads: CAUTION: If you trade in your authenticity for safety, you may experience the following: anxiety, depression, eating disorders, addiction, rage, blame, resentment, and inexplicable grief. Sacrificing who we are for the sake of what other people think just isn’t worth it.

In the end, being real, true and authentic is the best gift we can give ourselves and the people we love. It is okay to feel anxious or shy to reach out or expose something about ourselves. An interpersonal awkwardness is a part of being human.

Gain the power of authenticity. If you choose it you are embracing your truth and being fearless enough to share it with the world. When you have nothing to hide and you can feel free to be yourself with everyone — there is profound peace and confidence you will exude to the world.

As Oscar Wilde once said: Be yourself, everyone else is taken.

Namaste, DeeDee