TFTD

How easy it is to blame our problems on others. "Look at what he's doing." . . . "Look how long I've waited." . . . "Why doesn't she call?" . . . "If only he'd change then I'd be happy." . . .

Often, our accusations are justified. We probably are feeling hurt and frustrated. In those moments, we may begin to believe that the solution to our pain and frustration is getting the other person to do what we want, or having the outcome we desire. But these self-defeating illusions put the power and control of our life in other people's hands. We call this codependency.

The solution to our pain and frustration, however valid is to acknowledge our own feelings. We feel the anger, the grief; then we let go of the feelings and find peace - within ourselves. We know our happiness isn't controlled by another person, even though we may have convinced ourselves it is. We call this acceptance.

Then we decide that although we'd like our situation to be different, maybe our life is happening this way for a reason. Maybe there is a higher purpose and plan in play, one that's better than we could have orchestrated. We call this faith.

Then we decide what we need to do, what is within our power to do to take care of ourselves. That's called living responsibly.

It's easy to point our finger at another, but it's more rewarding to gently point it at ourselves.

Fairy Thought

A musician must make music; an artist must paint, a poet must write, if he is to be at peace with himself. What a man can be, he must be.

  —Abraham Maslow

The same is true of a seamstress, carpenter, homemaker, lawyer, or mechanic. The question is, who and what am I? What must I do to be at peace with myself? What can I be, for that is what I must be? 

A lucky few of us find the answers to these questions fairly early in life, and we work to develop into the people we can be and must be. We do that by looking at our deepest desires, and ask what would bring fulfillment for us. We ask what we would enjoy doing most, what we believe we have the ability to be really good at. What is it that sometimes burns within us to be expressed or done? The answers to what we can be, what we must be, come from within, through asking ourselves these questions.

Fairy Message

What Are Your Priorities?

I was working away in my cabin, trying to print out the pages I had typed into my computer. It was taking half an hour to print each page. I had one hundred pages to go. For the umpteenth time I checked my computer, checked the program, checked the printer, checked everything I knew to see why it was printing so slowly. It all seemed to be set up properly. Then I accidentally touched a control setting, one I hadn’t noticed before. It was my priority control. It was set on low. I switched it to high priority. The pages now began to print at top speed.

Priorities are important. Learning how to focus our energy according to priorities– even though we’re going with the flow– is an important part of our lives. It’s one of the powers we’re learning.

What are your priorities? Is living from your heart one of them? Are there tasks you’d like to accomplish? Skills you’d like to acquire? Is meditation being centered, and living your life from a place of balance an area you’ve designated as critical?

Is loving yourself a priority? How important is your spiritual growth? What priority have you assigned to other areas like pleasure, having fun, feeling joy? Are your priorities set on high, medium,or low?

Look around and you’ll see your answers. Your life as it is now reflects the priorities you have chosen so far. If something is happening too slowly, try switching your priority setting from low to high.

The 'hanger-oner'

Oh for a free evening......

First he doesn't go--for a verrrrry long time.
Then he goes.
Then he doesn't go...and then he goes again.

*shaking head*

I'm washing the dusting rags that collected under the kitchen sink--which explains where they all were when I decided maybe I oughta spend tonight doing some dusting in the study....since I can, and DID, write my name in the dust.  k...it wasn't my name I wrote, but I wrote in the dust and now I need to make it (and the rest of the disgusting dust) go away.

I guess if you don't use the study, you don't see the dust.

<-- a="" at="" least="" multiple="" p="" study="" the="" times="" uses="" week="">
k..granted it's NOT like I used to use the study, but that's before they made touch screens that you can use when you're stuck on the couch and can't make it into a computer chair.......like for almost 18 months.

So I got spoiled on the touch screen--even if I don't like typing on the darn thing.  I can read!  Which isn't really helpful when you're catching up and wanting folks to know you're still out here.
Yes, well......  Himself is out for a meeting.  And I'm in the dusty study where there's writing on the furniture that needs to be removed, typing on the keyboard to the computer WHILE the dusting cloths are going 'swishy swishy' in the washing machine.

Yup......that sounds about right........LOLOL

Daily Reminder

It’s healthy, wise, and loving to be considerate and responsive to the feelings and needs of others. That’s different from caretaking. Caretaking is a self defeating and, certainly, a relationship defeating behavior – a behavior that backfires and can cause us to feel resentful and victimized – because ultimately, what we feel, want, and need will come to the surface.

Some people seem to invite emotional caretaking. We can learn to refuse the invitation. We can be concerned; we can be loving, when possible; but we can place value on our own needs and feelings too. Part of recovery means learning to pay attention to, and place importance on, what we feel, want, and need, because we begin to see that there are clear, predictable, and usually undesirable consequences when we don’t.

Be patient and gentle with yourself as you learn to do this. Be understanding with yourself when you slip back into the old behavior of emotional caretaking and self-neglect.

But stop the cycle today. We do not have to feel responsible for others. We do not have to feel guilty about not feeling responsible for others. We can even learn to let ourselves feel good about taking responsibility for our needs and feelings.

Fairy Reminder

How easy the breath that kills a flame,

How hard to kindle that light again.

Cold words kill and kind words kindle,

By words withheld a dream may dwindle.

—Joan Walsh Anglund

How we treat the people we live with affects the happiness of our family. Just as a breath can blow out a flame, a mean remark can cast a shadow across a brother or sister’s heart. People of all ages have left dreams behind because no one encouraged them. They are like candles snuffed out.

On the other hand, if we see a friend or family member feeling good about something they have done, we can learn to be happy for them. If we notice their excitement and encourage them with kind and sincere words, it will help their candle burn brighter. Sharing the happiness of others will make our own candles burn brighter, and it always feels good when we receive kind words ourselves.

Feel Good Fairy

Very often, the things you think will make you feel good in the moment will leave you feeling very bad in the long run. Yet you can choose to feel good by doing what’s truly good and right for you, for those around you, and for your world.

Don’t settle for just feeling good because of something you’re doing or something you have or someone you’re with. Don’t make your good feelings conditioned on what you’re watching, eating, drinking or experiencing.

Make the choice to feel great no matter what.

Imagine the freedom of not being held hostage to your desire for good feelings. Imagine feeling good because of your choice, and not being emotionally dependent on things that are beyond your control.

Life can feel great if you let it. Let it, by letting go of what you think you need and allowing the authentic goodness of who you are.

Feel good because it is what you choose to feel. Feel good, and free yourself from the needs that can steal your good feelings away.

Daily Reminder

We each vacillate between feeling confident on some days, lucky on others, and yet frequently scared on others. It’s very human to vacillate. We need not be anxious because our emotions refuse to stand still.

Changing emotions are part of the process of normal living. And changing emotions reflect an involvement with the moment. Situations do touch us, as they should. They do invite responses, as they should. And our responses will reveal our emotional involvement, as they should. We can cherish the variety of our emotions. They enrich us. But they may also create problems, if they go unchecked.

We need to maintain a balance. Confidence, certainly desirable, can become overconfidence and thus complacency. Confidence needs humility to temper it. Fear makes us cautious, and that’s good; but too much can immobilize us. Being in charge of our emotions makes them work for us.

Emotions can energize me and keep me involved with the moment. They can also control me. It’s my decision to be in charge.

Daily Reminder From the Fairy

Storms come. The lightning flashes. Thunder rolls. Sometimes the hail pounds so loudly and incessantly it becomes frightening. Sometimes storms do damage. But storms are not forever.

Just as nature plays out her storms, sometimes with violence, sometimes with gray days, sometimes with a gentle cleansing rain, we have storms in our lives, storms in our souls. Storms are part of life, part of growth, part of the journey.

Light a candle. Wrap up in warmth. Make yourself safe and secure. Then wait for the storm to pass, knowing it will.

Leaf Princess

Fairy Reading

“Lots of people hardly ever feel real soil under their feet, see plants grow except in flower pots, or get far enough beyond the street light to catch the enchantment of a night sky studded with stars. When people live far from scenes of the Great Spirit’s making, it’s easy for them to forget His laws.”
–Tatanga Mani (Walking Buffalo), STONEY

Nature is life’s greatest teacher. The natural laws are hidden in nature. Hidden are solutions to everyday problems such as conflict resolution, how to forgive, lessons about differences, how to manage organizations, how to think. Hidden are feelings. You can look at something and you will feel it. At night, have you ever looked at the sky when there are no clouds? As you look at all the stars, your heart will become very joyful. You will walk away feeling joyful and peaceful. We need to visit nature so we can see and feel these things.

Daily Reading

Every human being is a problem in search of a solution.
– Ashely Montagu

Despite the occasional distance or coolness that many of us sense within, we are also aware of wellsprings of emotion, ready to flow with feelings that have been long hidden. It sometimes takes a crisis, such as illness or loss of a loved one to literally drive us to seek help.

Trying to uncover deeply hidden painful emotions can feel like a treacherous path to follow, and some of us may be tempted to stop trying. But if we honestly open ourselves to these feelings, we can begin to know ourselves better and to build healthier and more mature relationships.

Change can be frightening, especially when I’ve been hiding from my own emotions. If there is a problem, dealing with my emotions is part of the solution.

TFTD

Each of us is blessed with an internal guide, a source able to direct our actions if we but acknowledge it. Never are we in doubt for long about what path to take. The courage to take it might not be immediately forthcoming; however, it, too, is one of the gifts with which we've been blessed. Courage is ours for the asking. Right direction is ours for the taking.

Trusting our inner selves takes practice, followed by attention to the results of our risks. M of us passively waited for others to orchestrate our behavior, our feelings, and our attitudes. Stepping forward as the leading person, with our own script in hand is quite a change, but one we are being coached, daily, to make.

Captured Memory9

Today's Reading

I believe that every single event in life happens as an opportunity to choose love over fear. --Oprah Winfrey 

 When our past is strewn with tragic and abusive experiences, it's not easy to recall events as opportunities to love. Yet today we are learning to forgive and to trust that we will always be cared for.  

We cannot change the past. What happened and how we responded helped carry us to this point in our journey. We can cultivate love, now, for the present. The people who care for us will support us. The experiences designed for our progress will come to us. We can be free of fear today, if that's our wish.  

I will not fear the events in my life today. I am ready for them. They need my involvement.

Daily Reminder

A thousand eyes, but none with correct vision.
--Isacher Hurwitz

William Shakespeare referred to envy as the "green sickness." There are only losers in the game of envy. When we envy someone else, we have judged ourselves and found something lacking.

Lack of self-love is the soil in which envy grows. Envious people are never satisfied. Self-pity is never sitting far from envy. We feel sorry for ourselves for what we don't have. Self-pity is like a swamp, the longer we stand in the muck, the more we stink.

Concentrating on what we do have is the perfect antidote for envy. Every one of us has our own special gifts and talents. We find these by looking at ourselves instead of looking at others. By becoming grateful for what we have, we can rejoice in ourselves.

C'mon over to MY house...

Fairy Thought

It is better to light a candle than to curse the darkness.
-- Chinese Proverb

With all the negativity that surrounds us, it is easy to become overwhelmed. It is also tempting to fight against the negative or to declare war on it. Yet a master teacher offered a better way: "Resist not evil, but overcome evil with good."

Imagine you are in a dark room. Wanting the darkness to leave, you curse and fight against it. But no matter how much effort you make, the darkness remains. Turn on the light switch, however, and the night vanishes in an instant.

In a similar manner, when the light of truth is shed on a situation, fear and disharmony dissolve. When you send out a positive thought to another person or take a constructive action, an enormous amount of good is accomplished. Each good act begets another until a network of love and light is created.

The purpose of life is to reflect this light into places that are dark. Let your light shine and stay focused on the power of love. When enough of us have turned on our spiritual light switches, the earth will become as bright as a shining star. Where, then, could darkness dwell?

Captured Memory8