Kismet

Thursday, September 22, 2016

I need to wake up, get up, get out of bed.

I need to brush my teeth,
look at myself in the mirror,
Turn the corners of my mouth up
Put my pants on, choose a sweater
Make breakfast (which I often leave untouched).
I need to write, I need to leave the house,
to see people, to meet people, to shake hands, to chit chat, to go to the grocery store, to the park, to the café, to find a new route home.
I need to close the door and open the door.
I need to sit on the tube, next to a stranger.
I need to watch a couple going up the escalator
kissing, giggling, holding hands
I need to go home,
I need to cook myself dinner, cook dinner for myself.
I need to look out the window and wonder, “What is he doing right now?”
Because
I need to accept the change.
The days are not the same anymore. The morning light is different, the smell in the room is not the same, there’s silence now. Sometimes I ask, “Wouldn’t it have been easier to stay? I was happy, wasn’t I? How can this possibly hurt so much?”

But listen, love (because you matter).

We need to wake up.
We need to close the door, we need to open the door.
We need to go to that yoga class, we need to go and see our friends, we need to make ourselves dinner, the first one, for ourselves.
We need to drink too much red wine because there’s no one to control us. We need to laugh. We need to go out in nature, to feel the sky above our head, to feel the cold grass beneath our feet.
We need to cry between the milk and the cheese selection at Tesco’s, squeezing a bottle of orange juice between our hands like an anchor.
We need to be okay on our own
when there’s nothing to do, nothing to read, nothing to watch, no one to chat with.
We need to sit with our feelings, we need to be alone
Because, “The only constant thing is change.” The change that I was seeking for so long.
By accepting that things are not the same anymore, we can start healing, adapting to it.
Only then can we start breathing, without holding it in every other breath.

Listen to me, love: this is good for us.

Deep down, we know this is the right thing to do.
Now, take it easy.
Feel it. Slowly.
Grab the feelings when they are good, bad, even when they are sad.
Because one day,
We will wake up, and we won’t have to force ourselves out of bed
One day, we will have already made the breakfast
And gone to work
And finished the yoga class
And made the dinner and sat by ourselves, and
we will smile, and the smile will not be an escape.

One day, we will feel good again.
We will be whole again.
~

Author: Sara Kärpänen

Image: coloredgrey / Flickr

Editor: Toby Israel

For Everyone:

Something is different today as our attention is drawn into the future. Messenger Mercury has been reminding us to use the rearview mirror since it turned retrograde on August 30. Finally, we must apply the lessons we learned as Mercury resumes direct motion. Additionally, the Sun's shift into peace-seeking Libra at 10:21 am EDT marks the autumnal equinox in the northern hemisphere. Meanwhile, the curious Gemini Moon stirs our mental restlessness.

Saturday, September 10, 2016

That was way too long.......................

For almost a century there was a thing called the “Jim Crow Law”s and from 1876 and 1965 there was an enforced mandatory segregation in all public places. Whites and blacks were not allowed to mingle in restaurants, post offices, restrooms, schools, stores or anywhere else. It was a dark time in modern civilization. While blacks were technically free, that was far from the truth until those laws were abolished in 1965.

Thursday, September 8, 2016

not the glass ceiling we are looking for to be broken

We are on the third rock from the sun. To make one complete rotation in 24 hours, a point near the equator of the Earth must move at close to 1000 miles per hour (1600 km/hr). The speed gets less as you move north, but it's still a good clip throughout the United States. Because gravity holds us tight to the surface of our planet, we move with the Earth and don't notice its rotation1 in everyday life.

In addition to spinning on its axis, the Earth also revolves around the Sun. We are approximately 93 million miles from the Sun, and at that distance, it takes us one year (365 days) to go around once. The full path of the Earth's orbit is close to 600 million miles (970 million km). To go around this immense circle in one year takes a speed of 66,000 miles per hour (107,000 km/hr)3. At this speed, you could get from San Francisco to Washington DC in 3 minutes. As they say on TV, please don't try going this fast without serious adult supervision.

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So the way of the universe are still hard to grasp. As I mature and try to do better and know understating women is still a challenge. As you can see by Michelle's comments we are not on the same page. 

Yes I might of been too graphic describing Monica Lewinsky's lips being on Bill Clinton's penis in the White House. This is NOT the Clinton Home and they should never step foot in there again. The hallway between the Oval office and the Presidents private office is restricted space yet still financed by the taxpayers and what takes place  is subject to his employers discretion. This is about good and evil. Michelle and I were have a debate on family values. I do not see how feminists applaud Hillary. I the the whole motherhood thing out the window? How does Hillary justify the marriage to their daughter?  

Lastly you could say Donald Trump is a gentleman. He embraced a women who at one time had to pose naked for money and still married her. True love wins. He loved her so much that part of her past is forgiven. When the universe brings you together and you feel that love connection you will do anything the keep it. 

We need to have a women President someday. Just not this one. She is evil. 

Michelle Marie Martin

September 8 at 6:59pm

Henry McClure Your comments are repugnant and repulsive. You totally are not getting the point and at this point you are being deleted from my friend list. What happened in the Clinton home is private and between them. The difference is that Melania Trump posed for money naked, that is NO role model for young women in this nation. I had hoped that you would be respectful of my space here but you are NOT.

Sooooooooooo Michelle; know I need an intern at mcre.  

Friday, August 26, 2016

The Power of Forgiveness: The Transformational Effect of Letting Go of Resentment

Letting Go

It’s certainly not easy to forgive. If someone has wronged you – inflicted pain, humiliated you, abused or exploited you – it’s entirely natural to feel bitterness and resentment. That’s surely what they deserve. Surely what they don’t deserve is our empathy and understanding, and certainly not our charity. Surely to forgive them just “lets them off the hook” and gives them licence to mistreat others.

But there are good reasons why forgiveness is worthwhile. A prolonged, constant sense of resentment doesn’t punish the person who wronged you, but only yourself. Carrying resentment – or a grudge against someone – drains of us our energy and well-being. It creates tension inside us, makes us rigid, and creates a general sense of negativity which seeps through the whole of our lives. In a sense therefore, by carrying resentment, we allow the person to continue hurting us. An act of forgiveness, therefore, means releasing this resentment, freeing ourselves from the tension and rigidity which comes with carrying a grudge.

Research has shown how beneficial forgiveness can be. In a study at Stanford University, 259 people were assigned to either a nine hour “forgiveness workshop” or to a control group. At the end of the workshop, the workshop participants reported significantly lower levels of stress and anger, and more optimism and better health. (1)

You might assume that, if you had the opportunity to take revenge on someone who has wronged you, this would give you a tremendous sense of well-being, a sense of catharsis which would purge you of your resentment and make you feel liberated. But research has shown that this is generally not the case. Whereas people who don’t seek revenge tend to “move on,” people who take revenge continue to ruminate about the situation, which prolongs the negativity. Situations which may have been seen as trivial are inflated and inflamed. The “catharsis” of revenge only leads to more bitterness and resentment. (2)

And in any case, acts of revenge are counterproductive in the long run. They only set up a cycle of violence which leads to more hatred, hurt and destruction on both sides.

Empathy and Understanding

I’m aware that this is very idealistic, of course. The idea of offering complete forgiveness to someone who has wronged you may be a step which you’re unwilling to take. It may depend on the severity of the incident, and how strongly it has affected you.

However, there are some intermediate points between vengefulness and complete forgiveness. It may help simply to try to understand the person’s perspective, and look at the reasons for their actions. Did they really intend to hurt you? And even if they did, were they really responsible for their actions? If they really are “evil” in some way, perhaps this is due to factors beyond their own control – for example, psychological or personality problems, or environmental factors. Perhaps they suffer from low self-esteem, insecurity, or a psychiatric disorder. Perhaps they had a terrible upbringing which has scarred or traumatized them. It’s also worth remembering that people who hurt and humiliate others are usually full of psychological discord themselves, and most likely extremely unhappy.

It doesn’t really matter conclusions you come to – the simple act of empathising with the person may release some of your resentment.

And once you’ve reached that point you may feel that you can further, to the point of forgiveness. In Sena’s experience, forgiveness was sudden and immediate, but according to the psychologists Enright, Freedman and Rique, the process normally has four stages. First, there is the “Uncovering Phase,” where you become aware of the negative effect your resentment is having on your life. Second, there is the “Decision Phase,” when you decide to let go of your resentment. Next is the “Work Phase,” where you cultivate your forgiveness, by accepting what has happened and trying to empathize with the offender. Finally, there is the “deepening phase,” in which your forgiveness leads to a deeper understanding of yourself and of life in general; you might, for example,develop a sense of empathy and compassion for others who have suffered in a similar way. (3)

We shouldn’t, therefore, think that forgiveness means letting the wrongdoer “off the hook.” We should forgive for ourselves, not for them. If anything, forgiveness means letting ourselves “off the hook” – that is, freeing ourselves from unnecessary anger and bitterness, which – as Sena put it – serves no purpose and blights ourselves our lives with negativity. As the saying goes, “The best revenge is living well.”

Perhaps we also have a collective responsibility to forgive, as a way of avoiding (or at least mitigating) the conflicts and wars which still rage throughout the world – all of which began and are continually inflamed by resentment, and which will keep raging until empathy and understanding overcome resentment. As Archbishop Desmond Tutu has written, “Forgiveness is an absolute necessity for continued human existence.”

Notes/References

http://learningtoforgive.com/research/effects-of-group-forgiveness-intervention-on-perceived-stress-state-and-trait-anger-symptoms-of-stress-self-reported-health-and-forgiveness-stanford-forgiveness-project/
http://psycnet.apa.org/journals/psp/95/6/1316/
Enright, R.D. (1998). Comprehensive bibliography on interpersonal forgiveness. In R.D. Enright & J. North (Eds.), Exploring forgiveness (pp. 165-186). Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press

About the author:

Steve Taylor holds a Ph.D in Transpersonal Psychology and is a senior lecturer in Psychology at Leeds Metropolitan University, UK. For the last three years Steve has been included in Mind, Body, Spirit magazine’s list of the ‘100 most spiritually influential living people’ (coming in at #31 in 2014).

Steve is also the author of Back to Sanity: Healing the Madness of Our Minds and The Fall: The Insanity of the Ego in Human History and the Dawning of A New Era. His books have been published in 16 languages and his research has appeared in The Journal of Transpersonal Psychology, The Journal of Consciousness Studies, The Transpersonal Psychology Review, The International Journal of Transpersonal Studies, as well as the popular media in the UK, including on BBC World TV, The Guardian, and The Independent.

Connect with Steve at StevenMTaylor.com and Facebook.com/SteveTaylorAuthor.