Life

The Most Radiant Pages

/ James Browning / 1 Comment

There is not enough kindness in the world and far too much of the opposite.  I can’t imagine anyone disagreeing with that statement.  In everyday life most people (including me until about ten years ago) are so blinded by where they have been and where they are going that little notice is made of each moment’s passing.  There were many years I barely paid attention to what was around me and to an even lesser degree, noticed the people in my momentary surroundings.  In the last decade a portion of the work to improve my quality of life has included improving awareness.  It has made a tremendous difference. 
 
Her name tag read “Sandra” as I walked up to the hotel checkout desk yesterday.  We made small talk for about a minute concerning the sun finally showing its face after three days of clouds while she processed my departure.  She handed the receipt to me and said “have a nice day”.  As I returned the sentiment I looked her straight in the eye making full visual contact for a split second and said “thank you” in earnest.  I felt her appreciation immediately.  I really saw her and she knew it. 

Many people disregard service personnel and treat them at best like they’re not there and at worst in a mean-spirited manner.  Certainly I can bow-up to bad treatment when I get it, but when getting decent to good service I always try to connect if only for a moment.  Time and time again I have seen how just a tiny little bit of kindness can make a difference.  Being pleasant and making full eye contact states that I really do see the other person.  That acknowledgment is a small kindness that I am convinced makes a difference.
 
After checkout, at the front of the hotel a prearranged car was waiting for me.  On the way to the airport, I came to know a person I will long remember.  Just having sat down in the luxury car’s backseat, an older gentleman who was the driver looked at me in the rear view mirror and asked how I was doing.  My usual response of “every day’s a good day, some are just better than others” pleased him.  He smiled and said “I’m a blessed man too”.  As we pulled out of the hotel driveway our special little time together continued as I asked where he was from.  He replied “I was born in Mobile, Alabama”.  With my response “I was born in Alabama too” a real conversation began.
 
So often service people like a cab or limo driver are hardly paid attention to by customers.  As I did yesterday morning with who life has thrown into my path, I often try a few exploratory exchanges to find out if a person is interested in conversation.  Most are.  The driver seemed very pleased that I took an interest in him.  I learned he had lived most of his life  in Indianapolis, first as a dietitian and later as a Chemist’s assistant.  The vocation he loved best was the latter that made use of his minor in chemistry for the last 15 years of his full-time working life.   He had retired and moved to Michigan six years previously for the “fishing” he said and was a part-time driver to help afford his “expensive fishing toys”. 
 
Our forty minutes passed quickly and it was only outside the vehicle when he went to get my suitcase out of the truck that I got a full look at him.  Short, African-American, full head of almost white hair, dressed well and quite distinguished looking.  I put my hand out as I asked what his first name was.  He replied “Carl”.  I shook his hand as I said “my name is James”.  I thanked him for the good conversation and wished him well.  In seconds I was inside the airport and Carl was off to pick up his last run of the day so he could go fishing in a few hours.  He is now another of my special “temporary friends” who will remain indelibly stamped into my preferred memory. 
 
So long it has been a traveling practice I can’t remember when it began. At least 25 years ago I began consistently saying six simple words of thanks just before I stepped off an airplane and onto the Jetway.  A moment before the exit door I direct my voice up front into the command cabin and say “Thanks for a safe ride guys”.  Rarely do they miss hearing me.  Without fail I get a pleased and positive response from them.
 
Why do I feel compelled to say thanks to the pilots?  First, I am truly grateful for each and every flight I am on that is flown safely.  And secondly, I am convinced there is not enough gratitude expressed.  There’s an over-supply of bitching and complaining but not nearly enough focus on what is good and goes well.  Saying thank you to the pilots is my way of putting a little more goodness into life on this planet.  Does it make a difference?  Yes, I think it does.  Each kindness may mean little by its self, but collectively the total of them all has to make a positive contribution to the overall quality of life for everyone.  Further, I know for certain saying “thank you” and expressing my gratitude makes me feel good.  And that’s the best reason I know to continue always doing it whenever I can!

Unselfish and noble actions are
the most radiant pages in the biography of souls. 
David Thomas

No Priviledged Access to Reality

/ James Browning / 1 Comment

Quite by accident last night on my hotel room TV I stumbled onto an episode of “Nature” on PBS that grabbed my attention.  In it naturalist Joe Hutto became “mother” to a flock of wild turkeys and lived with them day in and day out.  His year and a half with the birds gave him a unique opportunity to immerse himself in their lives and see the world through their eyes.  At one point in the program he said we do not have a privileged access to reality.  We have this tendency to live ahead:  to anticipate.  Wild turkeys don’t do that.  They believe all their needs will be met in this moment and life is not better ½ mile deeper into the woods and tomorrow.   This is it.  We betray our lives in the moment.  Wild turkeys remind me to be present; to be here.

In my life weeks and months have passed when I had a little presence in the moment.  Either something from the past was always haunting me or thoughts of the future were worrying me.  Often both were happening at once. Looking back I don’t recall a single bit of the anguish ever making my life better.  However, I could not see the complete waste being disconnected from “now” was.  Wandering around in the past or future tripping is like being lost in a fog without even being aware of the blinding mist.

Remex Sasson has a good explanation of what living in the present is: to be aware of what is happening to you, what you are doing and what you are feeling and thinking. It is being conscious of your thoughts and focusing them on the present. In this way you look at situations as they are, without coloring them with your past experiences. Living in such a way makes it easier to deal with whatever you are doing at the present moment. You see things as they are, without being influenced by fears, anger, desires or attachments.

For me rehashing the past or contemplating the future has a lot to do with control.  When I stop and focus, it’s a little crazy to realize I have tried over and over to get something in the past to make sense.  That was me trying to control the past; to change it; to bring it around to my way of thinking.  More often than not, the past just was and makes no logical sense.  I see that better today.

It took intention and practice to break my habit of excessive worrying about the future and fretting about the past.  Now the realization is clear all that was just a deeply ingrained bad habit.  There was no quick fix for me.  Intention and desire was the beginning for me to change.  Determination to improve my life made it possible. A meditation practice made my effort consistent.  And learning from a variety of people from Tolle to Epictetus, Lama Das to Moses, Collier to Seligman and more gave wisdom to urge me forward.

Sitting here at the keyboard my thoughts again drift to the “Nature” program last night where naturalist Joe Hutto repeatedly made the point that animals in the wild are much smarter than we give them credit.  He intimated it is a great mistake to think wild animals are dumb.  Just because they are completely ignorant of the ways of the civilized world does not make them stupid. They are born with genetic imprinting humans have lost over time due to lack of need.  Consequently in these times we are the ones that come into the world “dumb”. 

We’re living in a world that contributes in a major way to mental fragmentation, disintegration, distraction, de-coherence, says Buddhist scholar B. Alan Wallace. We’re always doing something, and we allow little time to practice stillness and calm.

No magical cure has found me.  There has no painless rebirth.  It has instead been a practiced awareness that came from repeated trial and error that changed things.  Now I can at least some of the time keep myself rooted in the present.  Gone are the days when 100% of the time my past and future roared like a waterfall to drown out all of the “now”.  It’s likely at least half the time I still am somewhere else other than the present.  But that also means about half the time I am right here, right now!

Within there is much awareness that I miss the one in my heart and look forward to feeling her in my arms tonight when I return from being away for several days. A smile comes and I resist trying to imagine our reunion in more detail.  Instead I hang on to the warm and contented feeling those thoughts bring knowing she waits for me and go back to whatever I am doing.  I am so very grateful to be at this juncture of my life where every moment is dear to me.  I’ll be home soon Darlin’.

Having spent the better part of my life trying either to relive the past or experience the future before it arrives, I have come to believe that in between these two extremes is peace.  Author Unknown

The Five Love Languages

/ James Browning / 3 Comments

At times I had told others “I am my own lab rat”.  Such a strange statement has a fairly simple meaning; I experiment and try things on myself in a quest to improve and grow.  From self-hypnosis (which I got decent results from), to lucid dreaming (never could get in the habit of doing it) to meditation (which I get great results from) to lots of other experimentation I remain open to finding what can make a positive difference in my life. 
 
Several months back someone told me about the book “The Five Love Languages: How to Express Heartfelt Commitment to Your Mate” by Gary Chapmen.  I got a copy of the book and on my current business trip brought it along.  It has been difficult to put down.  The concepts are presented in a down to earth manner that makes complete sense to me.  I have gained a lot of insight into relationship difficulties in the past and opportunity for the future.  While the book’s frame of reference leans toward married couples, it is applicable to anyone in a serious relationship.  I have had several strong “ah ha moments” so far and will complete the book before I get home.
 
The primary concept of the book is that each person has a specific love language (sometimes two) that is essential for him/her to feel loved.  If a partner “speaks” the language the other needs, the relationship is far more rewarding, comfortable, intimate and resilient.  Even when difficulty comes it is more readily and constructively dealt with when both partners are speaking/hearing each other’s language.  Otherwise one person in the relationship figuratively ends up speaking “Dutch” while the other is using “Italian”.  Then neither understands the other at all.

Here are the 5 languages of love outlined in the book:

Quality time: For one who needs things spoken to them in this language, things like spending time together, eye contact, deep and meaningful conversations and shared activities are needed to feel loved. Bonding time with their partner is what is most important to them.

Receiving gifts: When you are with a partner who relishes little gifts and surprises, this is precisely what you will get. You will constantly be showered with new clothes, flowers or other presents. This is how they want to be loved and is exactly what they do for their partners.  This doing for another person is expressing what they actually need themself.  Giving the gift of one’s own time is also an important symbol of love to these people.

Words of affection: This works by giving your partner near constant reinforcement, compliments, sweet love notes and lots of encouragement. This is important because those who speak this language are sensitive people and need reassurance on a highly consistent basis.  They thrive on being told they are loved and are important.  Such a person can become fearful and uncertain without it.     

Physical touch: If this is the language of your partner they will be very affectionate or, as some like to call it, touchy-feely. Sex to them means much more than just an orgasm – it is a way to connect. However, they desire contact far beyond sexual activity.  Holding hands, hugs, and caresses are very important to these men and women.  Without physical contact a person who needs the language of Physical Touch can feel unloved.

Acts of service: Some people find pleasure in doing things for others. By doing these people are actually illustrating what they want and need themself.  Such a man or woman may show love by helping out, doing chores, running errands or gladly doing things for a partner, whether desired or not.   However, the only acts that matter are those done out of love, not obligation.

While I still have about a third of the book to go, the “Languages” of love I personally need spoken to me are already apparent.  I was able to confirm my initial impressions with a quiz you can take at this link to find the language of love you need: http://www.beliefnet.com/Love-Family/Relationships/Quiz/The-5-Love-Languages-Quiz.aspx
 
Here are my Love Language Scores:
10 Words of Affirmation
10 Physical Touch
7 Quality Time
2 Acts of Service
1 Receiving Gifts

The highest score possible is 12.  I scored a high need to be spoken to in two distinct “Languages”:  Words of Affirmation and Physical Touch.   Accordingly to the book two is not unusual but more than two is.   Simply, its Affirmation and Touch that make me feel loved.  Quality Time matters some, but Acts of Service and Gifts really are not my needs. That all rings true for me.
 
Now it’s easy to see I played to my own need in every past love relationship. If those things were the needs of the other person, that was a good thing.  If I was involved with someone who needed one of the three other Languages spoken to her, I never fulfilled her needs.  I was too busy giving what I wanted, thinking I was showing love by doing that. That all seems so simple now to the point of “duh, why did I not see that before?” I am very grateful to have this insight!

Love makes your soul crawl out from its hiding place.  Zora Neale Hurston

More about Gary Chapmen’s “The Five Love Languages”:  http://www.5lovelanguages.com/learn-the-languages/the-five-love-languages/

Shouting From the Rooftops

/ James Browning

Yesterday was for the most part was uneventful.  It was a busy one when I was up early for a business trip and spent a good part of Monday dealing with travel and waiting for a delayed flight. Traffic on the drive to the airport was light.  One flight was a bit bumpy but unremarkable otherwise.  People I encountered were nice for the most part or at least neutral in my interactions with them.  There were no hassles getting a cab to the hotel once I arrived at my destination.  My hotel reservations were good and I checked in with no issues.  It was a completely unremarkable day, except for one thing:  I am in love with a remarkable woman and she is in love with me.

 As the saying goes “this is not my first rodeo” and I have known love before, but not at the mature yet lovingly sweet level she and I share;  calm, yet intense; reserved, yet completely unbridled; appropriate yet highly passionate.  I think the good we are experiencing together has a lot to do with being old enough to truly appreciate each other and the opportunity to love again in our late 50’s.  Having loved and lost makes another chance here in the fall of life all the more treasured. 
 
She and I are a good match.  We have attended the same 12 step program (Codependents Anonymous) for a long while and have come to know each other in those meetings from the inside out.  Long before there was anything romantic between us we were caring members who dealt with their individual issues by sharing them with the group.  Within the group there was support and a bond of in common life experiences.  It was in that environment we became attracted to each other. 
 
Individually she and I have been through great heartache, difficulty, bad choices and misfortune.  We have remorse but are at peace with what is behind us.  Each has had to fight to reclaim life and grow beyond who and what we were before.  We are in ways new as a teenager might be in the way love is experienced.  Our new ability to feel combined with wisdom gained the hard way allows us an unusually strong bond based on truth, honesty and open emotion.  Today I write here for her in a way that “shouts from the rooftops”…I love you… I really … really … really do.
 
From wisegeek.com:  Generally, when a person falls in love they have heightened romantic interest in someone else, and this doesn’t necessarily have to occur at first sight. Many people are friends first and find over time their feelings change to those more romantic in nature.

The word fall suggests that there’s a certain helplessness about these feelings of attraction, and they’re not necessarily within the control of the person stricken suddenly with great affection. It would be hard to dispute that initial feelings of attraction and the “falling in love” state are powerful. For centuries, writers and poets have sung both the agonies and joys of discovering passionate feelings for someone else. Chaucer called this early “love” state the “dreadful joy” representing both the pitfalls and ecstasy. Infatuation and romantic interest especially at the onset of a relationship can be both painful and exciting.

People have verifiable physiological reactions when in this early love state. A sight of the object of their affection may cause the pulse to race and the body to sweat. Certain neurotransmitters in the brain tend to be produced in greater volume, which can promote happiness and some anxiety. Yet most social scientists would agree that the reaction is not entirely a chemical one and involves the thinking brain and the emotions on numerous levels.

When I look toward the horizon, I can not today envision the journey there and beyond without “her”.  Yet I have no way of knowing what the future will bring.  Instead, with great hope I am open to what comes and that is enough.  To be in love and to have dreams of sharing life with her is a gift bigger than I imagined would come again. 

 I dare not borrow too much from fate by allowing myself to put excessive energy into what might be.  Instead I will be content with what I am certain of today:  I love you K.E.  Truly and faithfully I do.  I am grateful for you more than I know how to express.

Grow old with me!  The best is yet to be.  Robert Browning

Shelter from the Storm

/ James Browning / 1 Comment

For the majority of my days there was a storm going on inside me.  I assumed that state of being was how life was for everyone and came to accept the uncertainty, questioning, doubting, worrying and yearning.  These thoughts and feelings are part of a normal human experience, but not at the hurricane levels they blew me around within the hell I lived in.  

I am glad the constant storm is over now.  The winds rise from time to time, but never as they once were.  In recovery from dysfunction I had to learn how to be alone.  Those dark nights and colorless days of loneliness were long but ceased to paint my life all dark colors a while back.  A good example of what does not kill you makes you better is how I was able to trade insecurity and loneliness for a capacity to love life; a true miracle of sorts!

Life has been genuinely good for a while now.  In recent months good has become better and now wonderful as love of a woman has entered my heart.  There was acceptance such a thing would likely never happen again which makes the surprise a gift all the sweeter.  In my journey through the miles of loneliness I ran across a saying that helped me never completely lose faith in the possibility of love, no matter how distant it seemed.  Get yourself emotionally healthy and someone healthy will find you. And that is exactly what happened! 

Reflecting on those two sayings in italics above that have been my encouraging companions, I started to think of a few other “friends” in word that have helped me in my journey. 

When the pain to stay the same exceeds the pain to change, we change.  A living example of those words I am.  It would be grand if I could tell you how strong and determined I was and such strengths moved me to grow and heal.  That did not happen and it took desperation instead.  Only then was I was willing to do whatever was necessary to leave the emptiness and pain behind.  

You can only love someone else as much as you love yourself.  This has nothing to do with ego and all to do with seeing the good in me and accepting the not so good; appreciating my talents and attributes and seeing past my flaws and imperfections.  It is the perfectly imperfect way of seeing that gives fertile ground for love to grow in, of myself and others. 

Every day’s a good day, some are just better than others.  I did not believe the meaning of those words when they began to be my steady response to “how are you?”  Slowly over time as I experienced improvements from applying myself to growth and healing, the statement became a sort of mantra I believe today with all my heart and soul.  

One of the worst mistakes anyone can make is being afraid to make one.  Just as walking without falling comes when stumbling over one’s own feet from trying too hard is stopped, life has more success when error is allowed and accepted.  For me it works like that now.  I screw up more, but I succeed far more often!

Learn to smile at yourself and you’ll always be amused.  I said this for years because I thought it was a catchy and clever line.  There was even a fragile belief I lived that way.  Until a few years ago that was utterly a delusion.  While I will never be a comedian or good joke teller, I certainly find lots to laugh about as I healthfully stumble forward.  

You find what you go looking for.  Expect crap and it will rain on you every day.  Expect good and it will come.  This is not a naïve statement of a person wearing rose-colored glasses.  The difficult and the painful still come.  Living with this belief strong in my heart and mind simply diminishes the bad and expands the good.  No more, no less.

Love is all that matters.  Love of life, love of family, love of friends, love of nature, love of a partner, love of God…. whatever form it comes it, love is the force that gives EVERYTHING meaning.  Without love life is just existence. 

I am thankful for every instance one of these sayings got me through a time of deep difficulty or dark challenge.  Each has been, and will continue to be, a dear friend and at-will momentary mantra to “save” me.  I am grateful!

Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls.  The most massive characters are seared with scars. Kahlil Gibran

Once Upon a Time in the Hills of Alabama

/ James Browning / 2 Comments

An old book of rhymes I bought for two dollars by a forgotten local Tulsa poet stirred some distant memories as I thumbed through the pages this morning. He wrote of things before my time I often could not relate directly to like when the ice man brought ice to his house, sleeping on a feather mattress or the conductor on a night train. Some of my grammar school year memories from around five decades ago will be just as unfamiliar today to any “young’un”. Even to me some seem far-fetched or made up when I tell the stories, even through they are truth or at least truth as I remember it.

Clearly I remember the old alcoholic who would buy bottles of lemon extract flavoring at the country store. Being high in alcohol content he’d be plastered from drinking it and be laying in the weeds singing within a quarter-mile from the store happily lost in his oblivion.  Eventually the store stopped selling the stuff to him.

My 5th grade teacher was Miss Pittman and as the prefix implied she had never married. At least 60 years of age, she lived in the rundown teacher dorm behind the high school with one other “old maid” female teacher. By the time I got to high school she had passed on and the dorm was torn down. I wonder how she would feel today about me recalling her as the meanest teacher I ever had!

There was Dick Butterworth who liked us kids. Weekdays he was a local laborer and on weekends he was a professional happy drunk. On Saturday when he was high on booze we kids could convince him of just about anything. Once my brother, two cousins and I had him believing there was a little man who lived in the well by the store. He had a flash light and was looking down trying to find him in the well. Thinking back I am glad here was a cinder block housing around the well or he would have fallen in!

When I was six my father, mother, little brother and I went on a Sunday to visit my Mom’s first cousin in prison where he had been sent for moon shining. Clearly I recall a bucket on a rope being lowered by from a guard tower for car keys to be placed and surrendered during the visit. And inside the fence in the outdoor family picnic area the barbed wire at the top made me uneasy even as a child. That experience probably has a little to do with why I have never been arrested and kept myself straight with the law.

There was a milk cow my grandparents had they called “ole three tit”. There should have been four on her and I never knew if the missing one was from an accident or genetics. I had been told the cow did not like kids. Being the bull-headed boy I have always been there was no problem going against what I had been told and heading to the barn at milking time. I will never forget the cow coming after me and my grandmother protecting me with a two by four she wacked the old girl with! I got in trouble but did not get hurt. My Papa (grandfather) took “ole three tit” to the cattle sale within a week or two.

Raising chickens was big business on the farm and there were two “chicken” houses longer than a football field and probably forty feet wide. In between grown ones being taken away and chicks being delivered was a few weeks where the fertilizer laden (OK chicken poop laden) sawdust on the floor was changed out. On a rainy day during such times my brother and I would hunt rats that fed on the ground corn the chickens were fed. And I mean RATS not mice! When we got one, which was not often, you’d think we had bagged big game in Africa.

A clothes pin and a piece of cardboard or playing card placed correctly could make a bicycle sound kind of like a motorcycle. At least we thought so. But to get a temporary throaty engine sound nothing worked better than tying a balloon so it interacted with the spokes. It lasted only a short while until the balloon wore through, but in those moments I felt like I was on a Harley!

Or there was George Parker who spoke with a speech impediment and dipped snuff. I saw him many times spit the nasty stuff in the top breast pocket of his overalls. That’s makes my face scrunch up even now thinking about it. Or I remember the time Bud Stansell and his wife were robbed by escaped convicts that the police caught in a cornfield within sight of my grandparent’s house. Bud’s head was bandaged up from where they had hit him and I learned a new “cuss-word” or two as he spoke his mind while the highway patrolmen loaded the prisoners up.

Memory is clear when my Dad ran a country store and after closing time some of his buddies would show up so they all could drink beer and play bluegrass music around the wood stove heater in back.  Another relic of times past is “The Lord Provides Shinebone Valley Country Store” pictured at the top.

Growing up, all I wanted was to leave the rural south behind as far as possible. As an adult I made that wish come true. I have come to realize that as a child I was witness to the last of a way of life in rural Shinbone Valley, Alabama that had not changed much in a century and a half. That old way of life is almost completely gone now. Interstates, TV, air travel and the like helped bring about rapid change that I have embraced and enjoyed. However, I will always be grateful for the unique memories I have from my childhood that for their time were as good as anything Mark Twain ever wrote about.

Don’t you wish you could take a single childhood memory
and blow it up into a bubble and live inside it forever?
Sarah Addison Allen

Gratitude: The Cure for Dissatisfaction

/ James Browning / 4 Comments

Why are so many of us unhappy? Why are mental health problems growing so rapidly? According to the Surgeon General 1 in 5 American adults AND children are affected by a mental disorder during each year! WHY?!?!

The following comes from an anonymously written editorial on the website chinatownconnection.com.  It is titled “Why Are Americans so Unhappy” and I believe sheds light on the “why”:

Is it that we have electricity and running water 24 hours a day, 7 days a week? Is our unhappiness the result of having air conditioning in the summer and heating in the winter? Could it be that 90+ % of these unhappy folks have a job? Maybe it is the ability to walk into a grocery store at any time and see more food in moments than Darfur has  seen in the last year?

Maybe it is the ability to drive from the Pacific Ocean to the Atlantic Ocean without having to present identification papers as we move through each state? Or possibly the hundreds of clean and safe motels we would find along the way that can provide temporary shelter? I guess having thousands of restaurants with varying cuisine from around the world is just not good enough. Or could it be that when we wreck our car,  emergency workers show up and provide services to help all involved. Whether you are rich or poor, they treat your wounds and even, if necessary, send a helicopter to take you to the hospital.

Perhaps you are one of the 70 percent of Americans who own a home. You may be upset with knowing that in the unfortunate case of having a fire, a group of trained firefighters will appear in moments and use top-notch equipment to extinguish the flames, thus saving you, your family and your belongings.

Or if, while at home watching one of your many flat-screen TVs, a burglar or prowler intrudes, an officer equipped with a gun and a bullet-proof vest will come to defend you and your family against attack or loss. This all in the backdrop of a neighborhood free of bombs or militias raping and pillaging the residents – in neighborhoods where 90 percent of teenagers own cell phones and computers.

How about the complete religious, social and political freedoms we enjoy that are the envy of everyone in the world? Maybe that is what has 67% of you folks unhappy.

A 2011 Gallup poll found Americans were somewhat or very dissatisfied with overall quality of life (23%), opportunity to get ahead by working hard (45%) and moral and ethical climate (70%).

Ruut Veenhoven of Erasmus University in Rotterdam does research on the subjective appreciation of life and maintains the “World Database of Happiness”. He found the United States not even close to the top ten with a general level of happiness that places our country at 17th!

OK. Now that I added fodder to the general murky mood in the U.S.A., please allow me to offer my perspective. When I had little growing up I did appreciate the things I did have, even though I yearned for more. Anything new was most often received with joy even if it was new clothes under the Christmas tree and few toys. When I was a struggling 20-something I remember buying my first new couch on credit that took 18 months to pay for. I loved that couch and to this day have never appreciated a piece of furniture as I did that one. Living after a natural disaster in a foreign country without running water for six weeks and electric service for almost three months taught me gratitude for those two things I had always taken for granted.  In retrospect of my life I can see it was lack and struggle that made me appreciate things most.  It was rarely, if ever, abundance that brought any more than momentary gratitude.

As a middle-aged adult I “made it” and had the resources to have and do most anything reasonable I wanted to do. I worked for years under the guise that $$ would make me happy but instead my unhappiness grew to its maximum level that accentuated every fault and dysfunction I had.

My level of contentment and appreciation of life today is the highest ever. While it took a lot of work, changing what was going on inside of me brought that about. It is my opinion that is what is wrong in our country today: Looking outside our self for “other esteem” will NEVER bring about good self-esteem within. I am living proof of that. If success, money, sex, awards, accomplishment, things and external experiences could make someone happy I would have floated away in delirious bliss years ago. Instead, it took pain and heartache followed by lots of deeply emotion inner work to open me to the sources of happiness. There is nothing perfect about my life. Trouble, concern and worry are still around. But today those things sit mostly on the bench in my game of life while contentment, caring and love are the primary players with gratitude as the quarterback.

Riches, both material & spiritual, can choke you if you do not use them fairly. For not even God can put anything in a heart that is already full. One day there springs up the desire for money & for all that money can provide: the superfluous, luxury in eating, luxury in dressing, trifles. Needs increase because one thing calls for another. The result is uncontrollable dissatisfaction. Let us remain as empty as possible so that God can fill us up. Mother Teresa

Whatever is – is Best

/ James Browning / 2 Comments

Happiness permeates my being today as it has consistently lately. I am in love; swept into the rapture of  finding a soulful match with another.  Joy walks with me now, but I know I am not done with sorrow and pain.  The best life anyone ever had was a great deal of happiness with a lot of heartache mixed in.  For all human-time that is the best possible.  To acknowledge the breadth of life experience possible, from pure joy to absolute pain, is to fully come to cherish life in all its dimensions.

Paraphrasing Kahlil Gibran, joy is the mirror reflection of sorrow and sorrow is the necessary companion of joy.  The more of each one I come to know, the more of the other I am capable of knowing.  So when I lament the heartache that has come my way, I soothe myself with the knowing that the hurting is growing my capacity to know happiness deeper and to recognize joy even at its smallest.   I am living proof that the plow of pain opens the furrow for greater happiness to grow.  Hence, I can not hate my past grief and pain, nor can I dread what will yet come.  Simply, whatever is; is best.

“Whatever is – is Best” by Ella Wheller Wilcox

I know, as my life grows older,
And mine eyes have clearer sight,
That under each rank wrong somewhere
There lies the root of Right.

That each sorrow has its purpose,
By the sorrowing oft unguessed,
But as sure as the sun brings morning,
Whatever is – is best.

I know that each sinful action,
As sure as the night brings shade,
Is somewhere, sometime punished,
Tho’ the hour be long delayed.
I know that the soul is aided
Sometimes by the heart’s unrest,
And to grow means often to suffer,
But whatever is – is best.

I know there are no errors,
In the great eternal plan,
All things work together
For the final good of man.
And I know when my soul speeds onward,
In its grand eternal quest,
I shall say as I look back earthward,
Whatever is – is best.

“The Thing Is” by Ellen Bass

The thing is
To love life
To love it even when you have no
Stomach for it, when everything you’ve held
dear crumbles like burnt paper in your hands
and your throat is filled with the silt of it.
When grief sits with you so heavily
It is like heat, tropical, moist
Thickening the air so it’s heavy like water
More fit for gills than lungs.
When grief weights you like your own flesh
Only more of it, an obesity of grief.
How long can a body withstand this, you think,
And yet you hold life like a face between your palms,
A plain face, with no charming smile,
Of twinkle in her eye,
And you say, yes, I will take you
I will love you again.

If your pain is so intense you can barely pull yourself into a new day, know the pain will lessen in time.  If your sorrow is so deep you can’t imagine tomorrow coming, know the morrow and the one after and the one after that will come to find your sorrow lessened.  If your life is so dark you can’t imagine yourself anywhere but in shadow, know the light can not be stopped from returning and it will find you.

Life has taught me to live the most difficult one step at a time, one moment at a time.  Just get through it.  Do the best I can, no matter how feeble my best was that day.   And never stop no matter how much I want to, how miniscule my progress or even if I  back slide.  Just two words:  Keep going.

Thankful I am for what is behind me, for the good that is today and for the strength and wisdom I have been blessed with to help me embrace what is to come.

 I have found the paradox, that if you love until it hurts,
there can be no more hurt, only more love.
 Mother Teresa

I’ve Made It

/ James Browning / 2 Comments

In the last year a person came into my life who fairly rapidly became a close friend. She is easy to talk to, insightful and in ways sees me with far more clarity than my self view allows. When I was afraid to fall in love with the dear woman in my life now, P. encouraged me. For that I will always be grateful. Frequently she will email a random thought she had that turns out to be right in the strike zone for what I needed to read that day.

Yesterday she wrote: That the reason you had to go through all you went through and worked your way out of is to help others now. Your path in life could be destined to show others the way, the truth, and the light. The added bonus is that this makes you a happy man. You’ve made it, continue to make it. You are being rewarded for 58 years of trying. You have influence on lives you are not aware of. That is a wonderful thing.

For me it is very humbling to read P.’s words. Making a difference has always been a desire in my heart but its daily practice came about because I felt it had to. Uncertainty as to how to explain that fills me. In the last few years recovery from depression and other related “stuff” came through involvement with others. Therapists and such were a big help, but peers who suffer as I have were the greatest help. There is something unifying about relating to a person who knows what one feels. Pain is like that. If I come to know your suffering is like mine, I don’t need specific details. The anguish is already inside me and I relate on an emotional level and feel you as a kindred soul. Boiled down, it’s very simple: Getting better together is much easier than getting better alone.

For the second time writing this morning my eyes water up for I don’t see myself as one who makes that much of a difference. Yet when I am told I do it moves me deeply for being a positive influence to others is something I admire greatly in others. Certainly I look up to people who have moved mountains for positive change. My admiration is great for writers and artists who left a bit of themselves behind that enhances living for others. Seeing a person be unusually kind to another moves me deeper than words that come at the moment will allow me to express. But to be thought of as one that makes a difference even a small way is difficult for me to grasp. It has been my affliction my whole life to have an unclear view of myself, often for a good reason like self-protection. To see good in myself is very, very difficult. That’s why being told I make a difference is so meaningful to me.

When a person thanks me for a kindness or expresses gratitude for a little help or encouragement, I mostly brush it off. My manner is to deflect praise as I do not know how to accept it.  Kind words are appreciated, but my ability to express thanks as I feel it eludes me to this day. Why else would I be sitting here typing this through tears? The emotion of the moment is gratitude; great, great gratitude. Humility overcomes me as I wonder how I got to be so blessed to have the life I  have now. Happiness has fully invaded my life to the point I find it almost unbelievable, yet accept it is as true with thankfulness and appreciation.

No longer do I hate the pain I have endured. Inside me there is little animosity any more toward those who have hurt me. The days of being lost in my own dysfunctions I now see as my necessary walk across the hot coals to arrive here and now. I am finding the strength to forgive myself for the heartache I have caused and in letting go of the guilt and shame, I find liberation. Each time I am forgiven and in each moment I give forgiveness the ability to give and receive mercy and absolution grows. Each kind word spoken touches my heart and makes me wish to give that gift back to someone else.  I feel with a greater propensity and depth that ever before.

Years ago I read we see our past lives as moving from one point in a straight line to another point. We see a starting place and a current position when in fact the line from then to now is jagged and twisted. I know well about my detours and getting lost along the way and in spite of all the twists and turns today I too perceive my life experience as a straight line. The difficulties of my youth made me more caring and emotional. The challenges of my adult life made me strong and resilient. The pain I caused others caused me to feel my own pain more fully. And so on to where I am today: abundantly happy, deeply and profoundly in love and humbly grateful for every moment of my life that brought me to this joy I feel today. Yes, P. “I’ve made it!”

Each morning when I open my eyes I say to myself: I, not events, have the power to make me happy or unhappy today. I can choose which it shall be. Yesterday is dead, tomorrow hasn’t arrived yet. I have just one day, today, and I’m going to be happy in it.   Groucho Marx

Life in a Pinball Machine

/ James Browning / 3 Comments

When my life was a mangle of unfulfilled hopes there was far too much time spent imagining the future or pondering the past. Today is quite different. I find myself enjoying “now” the vast majority of the time. The reason is simple. I like “now” more than what is behind me and I am not obsessed with what will be. My image of the future is it will be good because my “present” is good. By choices made now what is ahead of me is honed and shaped. Being awake to what is happening moment to moment is new to me, but I feel confident to have entered the best phase of my life. My best years are ahead!

Was it fate or destiny to have had the life I’ve lived and then to arrive in “the now” as I have? Was the pain, difficulty and heartache encountered predetermined as my life path? That’s quite a question and I am only one of over a hundred billion people who have probably pondered it at least a little. (It’s estimated that 107,602,707,791 people have been born on earth. For details go here: http://www.prb.org/Articles/2002/HowManyPeopleHaveEverLivedonEarth.aspx ).

A definition of Fate/Destiny I found on-line: the universal principle by which the order of things is presumably prescribed; the decreed cause of events which are inevitably predetermined. It’s quixotic to believe life for each person is decided in advance by God or some deity. My beliefs include a higher power that is there to support me along my way. However, I believe to have been given the freedom to choose and though every choice, and I mean EVERY choice, my life is shaped. The quality of my life is affected by me more markedly than any other force. God is with me, but does not decide for me. It was my fate/destiny to be born and one day die. What’s in between is mostly up to me.

When I take a glance backwards, I see myself bouncing around like a ball inside a pinball machine. Each time a pinball hits a bumper where the next impact will be is decided. And again and again it is the same. The pinball does not decide where it goes. The bumper decides. In my life experience each unique choice or “bump” I made seemed to power me to the next bumper and the next. I thought life was being done to me like a pinball bouncing around. I did not see my choices were self-made bumpers.

Neale Donald Walsch wrote: Every decision you make—every decision—is not a decision about what to do. It’s a decision about ‘”Who You Are”. When you see this, when you understand it, everything changes. You begin to see life in a new way. All events, occurrences, and situations turn into opportunities to do what you came here to do.

My clouded past is described well by Marcel Pagnol who said The reason people find it so hard to be happy is that they always see the past better than it was, the present worse than it is, and the future less resolved than it will be. To that my one word response is: “EXACTLY”!

Certainly there are happenings, circumstances and people that influenced the path I walked to get to the present. Behind me it was easy to place fault on what happened as “a pinball might blame bumpers for where it goes”. However, I am not a mindless pinball. My life should not be filled with only ”bounces” to what is around me. To have allowed the conditions of my life to shape my life experience was a lazy and difficult way to live. I know better now!

Richard Carlson said it well when he wrote circumstances don’t make a person; they reveal him or her. It took a long time for me to “see” what life was trying to reveal to me. Free of that ignorance I now agree with a quote from Nehru: Life is like a game of cards. The hand you are dealt is determinism; the way you play it is free will. And the way I play my hand today is to take responsibility for myself, to live with forethought and morals,to love as I have never loved before, to make good choices and to take life one day at a time. I know the best days of my life are yet to be lived.

We create our fate every day we live.
Henry Miller