Month: August 2013

I Finally Got Even

/ James Browning

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Once upon a time there was a little boy. Although his family was poor, life was good and he enjoyed his life. His Mother and Father did not get along well, but he did not notice much.

One day his Daddy ran away, leaving a note that read, “I’m gone for good. Don’t try to find me”. The little boy did not understand. He was very sad and became even more confused when his Mommy told him, “You’re now the man of the house. You gonna have to take care of your little Brother”.

After getting divorced his Mother was not around much, even though the little boy and his brother lived with her. His Father never came around. Mom was either working or going out with boyfriends all the time. The parade of different men confused the boy.

A man the boy did not like became his stepfather when he was ten. Mother said, “_____ has asked me to marry him and I’ve said yes. Is that okay with you?” So badly, the boy wanted to say, “No, he is a bad man.” but instead because he loved his mother and wanted her to be happy he replied, “It’s okay”.

Life for the boy and his brother worsened. His new “Father” was mean and treated the two boys as just being in the way. He got angry about the smallest thing and dished out painful physical punishment almost daily. The boys lived in fear and were made to work long hours every day after school, on weekends and during the summer.

The boy was growing up to be a man. Just before he was sixteen the new “Dad” drew back his hand to hit the now teenaged boy. Having had enough, in great anger the boy said “Go, ahead. I’ll stomp you until you’re a grease spot”. He meant it and would have tried to hurt the stepfather as badly has he could have.. Fortunately the older man saw that, never touched him again, but threw the boy out on the street to fend for himself three weeks later.

The teenager was homeless. With money enough for only two nights in a motel, he called the birth Father he barely knew saying, “I have no place to go. Can I come stay with you?” His Daddy said “yes”. And there he lived for a year while he and his Dad made the best peace they could.

Usually adult males who are unable to make emotional connections with the women they choose to be intimate with are frozen in time, unable to allow themselves to love for fear that the loved one will abandon them. If the first woman they passionately loved, the mother, was not true to her bond of love, then how can they trust that their partner will be true to love. Often in their adult relationships these men act out again and again to test their partner’s love. While the rejected adolescent boy imagines that he can no longer receive his mother’s love because he is not worthy, as a grown man he may act out in ways that are unworthy and yet demand of the woman in his life that she offer him unconditional love. This testing does not heal the wound of the past, it merely reenacts it, for ultimately the woman will become weary of being tested and end the relationship, thus reenacting the abandonment. This drama confirms for many men that they cannot put their trust in love. They decide that it is better to put their faith in being powerful, in being dominant.” Bell Hooks

A walk though the majority of his adult life shows the boy became like the description above. How could he have known the effects of surviving childhood would have so much to do with shaping his life? If we are born without the colors of life already painted, then it is childhood where the adult we become gets colored in.

I was that boy and I am that man. My gratitude overflows that in recent times I have been able to let go of most of it. And I finally got even with my evil stepfather; I became happy in spite of him!

You know all that sympathy that you feel
for an abused child who suffers
without a good mom or dad to love and care for them?
Well, they don’t stay children forever.
No one magically becomes an adult the day they turn eighteen.
Some people grow up sooner, many grow up later.
Some never really do.
…just remember that some people in this world
are older versions of those same kids we cry for.
Ashly Lorenzana

Image by Ruby Blossom
http://www.flickr.com/photos/rubyblossom/with/5993608893/

The Space I Have

/ James Browning

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I had a little talk with myself.

I asked, “If nothing was holding you back and you could live anywhere, where would you be?”

I quickly answered, “Right here where I am” but knew the answer was far more than location. Yet I had no better quick answer.

I asked, “Why don’t you know for sure exactly where you’d like to be”.

I answered, “That’s a good question. I think it is more a state of being, than a physical place. My happiness is not about being some where, it is about how I fill the space where I am.

“Please explain” I said to myself.

I answered, “It’s peace I want most; to wish to be nowhere else living any other life”. I found a description that hints at that: www.experienceproject.com

I am at peace and comfortable with and with in my self.
I am not always happy with what I do in a certain moment
but I accept it as “what I have done” and go on;
maybe to learn from it and to change in the future and maybe not.
I don’t fret too much over the flawed person I am.
I do my very best to pass this same understanding
and acceptance on towards others as well.
For, giving them the benefit of the doubt
(till such a time as they prove undeserving of it)
I trust that their intentions are for the best
even as I believe mine are.

I heard myself ask, “How do you find peace?”

I answered, “You don’t find it.  It finds you. Staying present and accepting life as it really is invites peace. I am grateful be reminded that peacefulness is not about being any particular place. It comes from how well I fill the space I have.

Acceptance is not liking
or agreeing with,
it’s not submitting.
It’s not fighting with or resisting.
It’s not giving in or strategizing,
it’s not even a step towards resolution.
Acceptance is letting go of all judgments,
opinions, positions and prejudices.
Acceptance is accepting everything
about what is and isn’t so
about any given situation.
If you want to find peace
first you must find acceptance.
http://www.peaceiswhereiam.org/

Mac and The Banger (repost)

/ James Browning

It’s been a year  later since I posted this originally. I’m thinking about the friends who inspired it (one of them passed about this time a few years ago). https://goodmorninggratitude.com/2012/07/12/mac-and-the-banger/

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While not a first-hand personal experience, I have had friends who knew they were in the last few months of their life and had them share some of the wisdom facing death brought them. To a person the near end of days brought a kinder and a gentler nature.

My friends who were faced with a soon to come reality of dying seemed to love more deeply and express how they felt more openly. Things mattered little and people were about all they cared about. Their primary regrets I recall them sharing were not doing things they had wanted to do, working/chasing money too much and not spending more time with people they loved.

No one close to me wrote down their thoughts as death drew near, but what is just below I believe expresses what they left behind in their own way.

– STOP
Give yourself permission to take a moment to really look at yourself & where you are.

– CLEAR
Create some room for those voices in your head to speak their mind, & then try to hear them.

– SHIFT
Be fearless with change – it might be the best thing you ever did.

– RELEASE
Let go those things that aren’t a reflection of who you want to be & who you really are.

– EMBODY
Be what you were meant to be in all its crazy shapes and guises – why wait?

– ADORE
Love who you have been, who you are now & who you are going to be – it’s all you.

– ENRICH
Move in a direction that enhances, empowers and deepens your life.

It turns out that no one can imagine what’s really coming in our lives. We can plan, and do what we enjoy, but we can’t expect our plans to work out. Some of them might, while most probably won’t. Inventions and ideas will appear, and events will occur, that we could never foresee. That’s neither bad nor good, but it is real.

From a last post by Derek K Miller of Vancouver, Canada on May 4, 2011, shortly before his death from cancer.

Two friends now gone taught me a great deal about living by how they acted facing death. Tears well up as I think about Mac and Bill (better know as “The Banger”) and how much I love them still, even in their absence, and how grateful I am my life was blessed with their presence.

Somebody should tell us, right at the start of our lives, that we are dying.
Then we might live life to the limit, every minute of every day.
Do it! I say. Whatever you want to do, do it now!
There are only so many tomorrows.”
Pope Paul VI

 

A Tiny, Miniscule Ripple

/ James Browning

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Laugh, and the world laughs with you;
Weep, and you weep alone.
For the sad old earth must borrow its mirth,
But has trouble enough of its own.
Sing, and the hills will answer;
Sigh, it is lost on the air.
The echoes bound to a joyful sound,
But shrink from voicing care.

Rejoice, and men will seek you;
Grieve, and they turn and go.
They want full measure of all your pleasure,
But they do not need your woe.
Be glad, and your friends are many;
Be sad, and you lose them all.
There are none to decline your nectared wine,
But alone you must drink life’s gall.

Feast, and your halls are crowded;
Fast, and the world goes by.
Succeed and give, and it helps you live,
But no man can help you die.
There is room in the halls of pleasure
For a long and lordly train,
But one by one we must all file on
Through the narrow aisles of pain.
Solitude” by Ella Wheeler Wilcox

One hundred twenty-eight years ago “Solitude” by Ella Wheeler was first published. The inspiration for the poem came as the then single Ms. Wheeler was traveling. She encountered a young woman dressed in black sitting across the aisle from her, crying. Miss Wheeler sat next to her and sought to comfort her for the rest of the journey. When they arrived, the poet was so depressed that she could barely attend the scheduled festivities she had traveled to attend. That evening as she looked at her own radiant face in a mirror, she suddenly recalled the sorrowful widow. It was at that moment she wrote the opening lines of “Solitude”.

What good fodder for thoughts of gratitude Mrs. Wilcox’s poetry above and below are for me this morning. Her words are nothing earth shattering, but then the most valuable wisdom rarely is. The commonality of many profound insights can easily be missed because long knowing the words can cause one to never fully accept or grasp their meaning.

Today I will be a little more understanding and forgiving of those who act differently than I think they should. Having no idea of pain the and grief someone may be bearing inside, unseen, I endeavor to show kindness more and appreciate it better when it is shown to me. That will, at best, send a tiny, miniscule ripple into the world. However, even in its smallness the little wave will make a positive difference. Every tiny motion for good always does and comes back multiplied to its sender.

It is easy enough to be pleasant
When life flows by like a song,
But the man worth while is the one who will smile
When everything goes dead wrong.
For the test of the heart is trouble,
And it always comes with the years,
And the smile that is worth the praises of earth
Is the smile that shines through tears.
Ella Wheeler Wilcox

As Simple and Difficult As That

/ James Browning

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A Search…
People spend a lifetime searching for happiness; looking for peace. They chase idle dreams, addictions, religions, even other people, hoping to fill the emptiness that plagues them. The irony is the only place they ever needed to search was within. Romana L. Anderson

A Hope…
Everyone has a moment in history which belongs particularly to him. It is the moment when his emotions achieve their most powerful sway over him, and afterward when you say to this person “the world today” or “life” or “reality” he will assume that you mean this moment, even if it is fifty years past. The world, through his unleashed emotions, imprinted itself upon him, and he carries the stamp of that passing moment forever. John Knowles

A Path…
One of the reasons why we crave love, and seek it so desperately, is that love is the only cure for loneliness, and shame, and sorrow. But some feelings sink so deep into the heart that only loneliness can help you find them again. Some truths about yourself are so painful that only shame can help you live with them. And some things are just so sad that only your soul can do the crying for you. Gregory David Roberts

A Gift…
She talked about wanting to be a part of something, wanting to be desired, to be ‘special’, craving to be loved. She talked about experiencing the kind of loneliness so immense it could swallow you up. She called it ‘loneliness that crowds couldn’t cure’. Cupcake Brown

This morning thumbing through quotes for inspiration, I found four that connected so well they spoke what I was wanting to say when I connected them. (Search) The hunt to be more fully connected to my truest self, (Hope) the desire to live more completely in the moment, (Path) the aspiration to feel the full breadth and scope of my emotions and (Gift) the dream of letting romantic love into my heart again.

An architect creates a plan to guide the builder. The builder uses the plan to direct construction. The foreman focuses the labor. And the title-holder receives the benefit. For my life, I am all four: Architect, Builder, Laborer and Title Holder. Only by taking ownership of all four and believing in the guidance of something bigger than me can my needs, hopes and dreams find reality. Create, build, work and believe. It’s as simple and difficult as that.

We dream to give ourselves hope.
To stop dreaming – well, that’s like
saying you can never change your fate.
From “The Hundred Secret Senses”
by Amy Tan

Extremes of Despair and Gladness

/ James Browning

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I wish some of my past could be erased; those parts I dislike most. Some were done to me, but many are things I did to others. It’s a hundred times harder to forgive myself than it is find forgiveness for another. My ability to let go beating myself up has improved a lot since I began successfully disputing my own BS a few years ago, but it’s still challenging, especially in a ‘down’ time.

Everyone messes up. Me, you, the neighbors, Mother Teresa, Mahatma Gandhi, King David, the Buddha, everybody.

It’s important to acknowledge mistakes, feel appropriate remorse, and learn from them so they don’t happen again. But most people keep beating themselves up way past the point of usefulness: they’re unfairly self-critical.

For most people, that inner critic is continually yammering away, looking for something, anything, to find fault with. It magnifies small failings into big ones, punishes you over and over for things long past, ignores the larger context, and doesn’t credit you for your efforts to make amends.

Therefore, you really need your inner protector to stick up for you: to put your weaknesses and misdeeds in perspective, to highlight your many good qualities surrounding your lapses, to encourage you to keep getting back on the high road even if you’ve gone down the low one, and – frankly – to tell that inner critic to Shut Up.

The only wholesome purpose of guilt, shame, or remorse is learning – not punishment! – so that you don’t mess up in that way again. Anything past the point of learning is just needless suffering. Plus excessive guilt, etc., actually gets in the way of you contributing to others and helping make this world a better place, by undermining your energy, mood, confidence, and sense of worth. Author and neuropsychologist Dr. Rich Hanson http://www.wildmind.org/blogs/on-practice/the-art-of-self-forgiveness

My gratitude is never stronger than when I come back to the ‘real world’ after a bout of cycling depression. If I am willing to get in the ring with the big “D.” and fight it things get better faster than if I just wait for it to pass.

There is darkness inside all of us… that part of our soul that is irreparably damaged by the very trials and tribulations of life. We are what we are because of it, or perhaps in spite of it. Some use it as a shield to hide behind, others as an excuse to do unconscionable things. But, truly, the darkness is simply a piece of the whole, neither good nor evil unless you make it so. Jenna Maclaine

There is no doubt that I appreciate contentment more than many people. Existing within a world of depression’s darkness and shadow even for a short time makes every breathe more precious when the lightness of ‘normal’ returns. You won’t hear many whines for I know it is the down times that ultimately make being alive so cherished. The wider the gap between the extremes of despair and gladness, the better I can bear the former and more I am grateful for the latter. Oh, what a difference a day makes!

I now see how owning our story
and loving ourselves through that process
is the bravest thing that we will ever do.
Brene Brown

Light Into the Darkness

/ James Browning

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I thought depression had mostly been put behind me. Things were looking up. Reclaiming my life for my complete own was arriving. I was happier than I have been in a long time ever. Having reduced my stress load and been true to my hopes it seemed I had outrun depression. But the little monster was always running behind waiting for me to stop looking over my shoulder so it could sneak up on me.

The brand of depression I wrestle with is far from the worst kind. Mine cycles in and out coming for a few days now and again. Once again I have been reminded there is no cure. All I can do rely on the methods that work to fight it off making its duration as short as possible and its intensity no more than it has to be.

How do I fight depression? Being with people I care about. Reading. Making myself get up and do things. Listening to music. Watching a movie. Taking naps. Spending time outside. Going for a walk. Writing down what I feel. The most important thing is to do something and not just sit and lay around!

Most of the time being depressed sneaks up on me. Something Elizabeth Gilbert wrote describes how my depression comes: “When you’re lost in those woods, it sometimes takes you a while to realize that you are lost. For the longest time, you can convince yourself that you’ve just wandered off the path, that you’ll find your way back to the trailhead any moment now. Then night falls again and again, and you still have no idea where you are, and it’s time to admit that you have bewildered yourself so far off the path that you don’t even know from which direction the sun rises anymore.”

The greatest weapon I have against being depressed is remembering it only lasts for a little while and passes. If I pay good attention each bout almost always teaches me something.

Why do you want to shut out of your life any uneasiness, any misery, any depression, since after all you don’t know what work these conditions are doing inside you? Why do you want to persecute yourself with the question of where all this is coming from and where it is going? Since you know, after all, that you are in the midst of transitions and you wished for nothing so much as to change. If there is anything unhealthy in your reactions, just bear in mind that sickness is the means by which an organism frees itself from what is alien; so one must simply help it to be sick, to have its whole sickness and to break out with it, since that is the way it gets better. Ranier Maria Rilke

It feels almost unnatural to attempt to find gratefulness for the depression that is upon me, but in my effort the shadow is already growing lighter just with this writing. I refuse to suffer in secret anymore. As the veil lifts over the next day or two as it always does, I will hold on tightly with gratitude to the knowing that it has been such times that hallowed me to be able to contain the depth of feeling I am capable of.

Don’t think about all those things you fear,
Just be glad to be here.
From the song “Hayling”
by FC Kahuna

Wildly and Dangerously Free

/ James Browning

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On the day when
the weight deadens
on your shoulders
and you stumble,
may the clay dance
to balance you.
And when your eyes
freeze behind
the grey window
and the ghost of loss
gets in to you,
may a flock of colors,
indigo, red, green,
and azure blue
come to awaken in you
a meadow of delight.

When the canvas frays
in the currach (boat) of thought
and a stain of ocean
blackens beneath you,
may there come across the waters
a path of yellow moonlight
to bring you safely home.

May the nourishment of the earth be yours,
may the clarity of light be yours,
may the fluency of the ocean be yours,
may the protection of the ancestors be yours.
And so may a slow
wind work these words
of love around you,
an invisible cloak
to mind your life.
“Beannacht” (Blessing)
from “Anna Cara:
A Book of Celtic Wisdom”
by John O’Dononue

Only recently have I discovered the writings of John O’Donohue and I thankful for the finding. He was a contemporary Irish poet, author, priest, and philosopher who lived only fifty-three years. His eloquent words are akin to prayers, just the kind that touch me deepest.

It is a strange and wonderful fact to be here, walking around in a body,
to have a whole world within you and a world at your fingertips outside you.
It is an immense privilege… We are here.
We are wildly and dangerously free.
John O’Donohue

Another Heart Whispers Back

/ James Browning

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At a time in history when we are communicating more rapidly than ever – via texts, tweets and email volleys, one after the next – it seems there is hardly anyone among us who couldn’t use some tips to facilitate more heartfelt communication for our in-person interactions with the people we care about most.

1. Tell them how important they are, often. Here’s a wake-up call for you: No matter how sure you are of someone’s love, it’s always nice to be reminded of it. Loving someone and having them love you back is the most precious phenomenon in the world, and it should be expressed as such. Be straightforward. If you adore someone today, show them. Hearts are often confused and broken by thoughtful words left unspoken and loving deeds left undone.

2. Communicate your feelings openly. Express how you truly feel. Say what you mean and mean what you say. Give the important people in your life the information they need, rather than expecting them to know the unknowable. Express your fears, tears, doubts and insecurities – let your loved ones experience YOU. Have the courage to be yourself in front of them. To be fully seen by someone, in raw form, and be adored anyhow, is what love is.

3. Speak the truth. As a wise man once said, “I tell the truth because it’s the easiest thing to remember.” Living through a facade puts an incredible burden on your emotional well-being. Speaking the truth, even and most often when it hurts, frees mental space and increases your ability to connect with the people you care about.

4. Ask thoughtful questions and listen intently. Too often we underestimate the power of a thoughtful question and a listening ear that’s fully present and focused. Although it’s a simple act, it may very well be the most powerful act of caring – one which has the potential to turn a life around. Listening is a sincere attitude of the heart, a genuine desire to be with another that both attracts and heals, perhaps without ever saying a word.

5. Let your actions speak for themselves. Actions often speak much louder than words. When you love someone you have to act accordingly. They will be able to tell how you feel about them simply by the way you treat them over the long-term. You can say sorry a thousand times, or say “I love you” as much as you want, but if you’re not going to prove that the things you say are true, they aren’t.

6. Touch has a lasting memory. Sometimes reaching out and taking someone’s hand is the beginning of a beautiful journey. Sometimes a long hug speaks louder than all the words in the world. And sometimes, quite frankly, a moment of touching is the difference between hopeless despair and the ability to carry on. Physical touch can make or break a relationship and can communicate respect or ridicule.

What’s here was taken from an article at a website called “Marc and Angel Hack Life”. It’s filled with good advice for living, loving and flourishing. I am grateful to have found it and recommend it highly. http://www.marcandangel.com/2013/04/23/6-ways-to-speak-well-to-your-loved-ones/

Every heart sings a song, incomplete,
until another heart whispers back.
Plato

My Close Relationship with Melody and Rhythm

/ James Browning

-------------------040ede0eFrom the time I can remember, music has been around me. My young parents were music fans who had a radio on most of the time. My youngest formative years were spent with Elvis, Hank Sr. and Patsy Cline.

By grammar school it was “Top 40” of the 60’s that was a soundtrack for my life. Today to sort out roughly what year a song came out all I have to do is think about what memories the tune brings up. From what I recall I can tell you where I lived and what was going on with me around the time the song was a big hit.

Lacking good examples of healthy emotions from my family of origin, many of my deepest feelings were developed through music. Every meaningful relationship I have ever had is associated musically in my memory.

During my brooding late teens/early twenties of the 70’s, lyrics like James Taylor’s influenced me (I’ve seen sunny days that I thought would never end. I’ve seen lonely times when I could not find a friend…).

Early memories of falling in love are associated with songs like Chicago’s “Beginnings” (When I’m with you, it doesn’t matter where we are, or what we’re doing. I’m with you, that’s all that matters…)

By the 80’s such feelings were better described by George Michael (If you are the desert, I’ll be the sea, If you ever hunger, hunger for me, whatever you ask for that’s what I’ll be…)

REM spoke about the type confusion I felt in the 90’s when success turned out to be mostly an empty achievement (That’s me in the corner, That’s me in the spotlight, Losing my religion…). Collective Soul’s “Shine” was another song for my quandaries then (Teach me how to speak, Teach me how to share, Teach me where to go, Tell me love will be there…).

In more recent times lyrics like Ha ha ha, bless your soul, You really think you’re in control? Well, I think you’re crazy… from Knarles Barkley or Confusion never stops, Closing walls and ticking clocks from Coldplay suggested change. Forgiveness and renewal had begun within me when Linkin Park’s words hit home (For what I’ve done, I start again, And whatever pain may come, Today this ends, I’m forgiving what I’ve done…).

Music exists in every culture, and infants have excellent musical abilities that cannot be explained by learning. Mothers everywhere sing to their infants because babies understand it. …certain cells in the right hemisphere respond more to melody than to language. Evidence suggests that long-term musical involvement reaps cognitive rewards–in language skills, reasoning and creativity–and boosts social adjustment. Music exercises the brain. Norman M. Weinberger

There is equipment that plays music in just about every room in my home. I can’t imagine life without it. Music has been companion, solace, teacher, compatriot, consoler and more. Whether they bring up a happy thought, a sad memory, a painful recollection or a delightful remembrance I am profoundly grateful for my close relationship with melody and rhythm. Music has been a friend that has never forsaken me.

Music expresses that which cannot be put into words
and that which cannot remain silent.
Victor Hugo