If a problem has a solution, there is no need to worry. If a problem has no solution, there is no need to worry. –The Dalai Lama
My cousin sent me this true story about a bear rescued from a bridge.
The bear was walking across the Rainbow Bridge on old Highway 40 in California. The bridge spans a dry gulch. Two cars crossing the bridge from opposite directions scared the bear and it clambered over the side only to find itself on a narrow ledge with no way back up and no way down. Falling or jumping meant certain death on the rocks far below. Although authorities were called, they could do nothing and they left the bear to its fate. The next day, they came back to see what had happened and found the bear sound asleep on the ledge. With renewed resolve, they rigged a net under the bear, tranquilized it, and lowered it to the ground where it woke up and calmly walked away.
Now that was an enlightened bear. It found itself in an impossible situation with no immediate solution. Instead of freaking out over something it could not control, and in spite of its dire circumstances, it took a nap.
That bear is my model for the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the first part of the Serenity Prayer. God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.
How can we attain the serenity to accept the things we cannot change? Once we have acquired the wisdom to know the difference between what we can and can’t control (The Wisdom to Know the Difference), why can’t we just focus on the courage to change the things we can (The Courage to Change), and let go of the rest? Where does that urge to control the things we can’t control come from?
For me, at least, I think it comes from fear. Fear blocks my serenity, so I need to address that fear before I can serenely accept anything. Does fear block your serenity? Let’s think about what we are afraid of and where that fear comes from.
To be continued....
In the meantime, I think I’ll take a nap!
If you would like to see some pictures and read more about the bear, click here.
Sunday, March 13, 2011
Friday, March 11, 2011
The Courage to Change
Risk
And then the day came,
when the risk
to remain tight
in a bud
was more painful
than the risk
it took
to Blossom.
–Anais Nin
The second line of the Serenity Prayer asks God to grant us the courage to change the things we can.
As we discovered before, basically the only thing we can control, or change, is ourselves. But changing ourselves is often difficult. And scary.
I spent most of my life driven by fear. Einstein said that the most important decision we make in our lives is the choice to see the universe as hostile or to see the universe as friendly. I chose to see world as hostile, although I did not recognize it as a choice at the time.
Then one night I ended up at the hospital with a pain in my solar plexus that was so excruciating I thought I was dying. The doctor in the emergency room asked me to rate the pain on a scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being childbirth. Without hesitation (and clearly without ever having given birth), I gasped, “12!”
The suspected diagnosis was gall stones but tests revealed none. Ulcer? Nope. They drugged me and sent me home with instructions for follow up tests. But by the next morning I intuitively knew, and I was right, that the tests would reveal nothing. I understood that this was my wake up call from life. In case I missed the point, or was tempted to ignore it, I ended up in the hospital again ten days later in a deja vu repeat.
Life was telling me that the choice to remain tight in a bud was more painful than making the changes I needed to make in my life to blossom. It worked. The physical pain I experienced those two nights was so alarming that I was willing to do most anything to not suffer from it a third time.
So I changed the only thing I could...me. It didn’t happen overnight or without setbacks, but I made a different choice about how I saw the universe. I chose to see it as friendly rather than hostile. I reset my homepage, so to speak, to a happy place by developing habits to grow a joyful spirit.
If you are reading this, you are probably making some changes in your life, too. Or you made them long ago. Or you want to make them. Setting out to change ourselves takes courage. We are very brave.
And then the day came,
when the risk
to remain tight
in a bud
was more painful
than the risk
it took
to Blossom.
–Anais Nin
The second line of the Serenity Prayer asks God to grant us the courage to change the things we can.
As we discovered before, basically the only thing we can control, or change, is ourselves. But changing ourselves is often difficult. And scary.
I spent most of my life driven by fear. Einstein said that the most important decision we make in our lives is the choice to see the universe as hostile or to see the universe as friendly. I chose to see world as hostile, although I did not recognize it as a choice at the time.
Then one night I ended up at the hospital with a pain in my solar plexus that was so excruciating I thought I was dying. The doctor in the emergency room asked me to rate the pain on a scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being childbirth. Without hesitation (and clearly without ever having given birth), I gasped, “12!”
The suspected diagnosis was gall stones but tests revealed none. Ulcer? Nope. They drugged me and sent me home with instructions for follow up tests. But by the next morning I intuitively knew, and I was right, that the tests would reveal nothing. I understood that this was my wake up call from life. In case I missed the point, or was tempted to ignore it, I ended up in the hospital again ten days later in a deja vu repeat.
Life was telling me that the choice to remain tight in a bud was more painful than making the changes I needed to make in my life to blossom. It worked. The physical pain I experienced those two nights was so alarming that I was willing to do most anything to not suffer from it a third time.
So I changed the only thing I could...me. It didn’t happen overnight or without setbacks, but I made a different choice about how I saw the universe. I chose to see it as friendly rather than hostile. I reset my homepage, so to speak, to a happy place by developing habits to grow a joyful spirit.
If you are reading this, you are probably making some changes in your life, too. Or you made them long ago. Or you want to make them. Setting out to change ourselves takes courage. We are very brave.
Wednesday, March 9, 2011
The Wisdom to Know the Difference
I quoted the Serenity Prayer recently. Here it is again.
God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.
At our monthly discussion group last night, we used to this prayer as the format for discussing Step 3, giving up the delusion of control. We started with the end of the prayer, trying to discern the difference between what we can change and what we can’t. We made lists of things we can control and things we can’t. Here are some of the things we came up with.
Things we can control – our responses to things, the thermostat, prioritizing our bills, what we wear, the advice we give our children, what we do or think or say.
Things we can’t control – kittens, weather, the choices our children make, the economy, whether we get laid off, what other people do or think or say.
We concluded that generally we can control ourselves, and generally we can’t control everything else.
That seemed like an easy and quick guide to discerning the difference. We felt very wise!
God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.
At our monthly discussion group last night, we used to this prayer as the format for discussing Step 3, giving up the delusion of control. We started with the end of the prayer, trying to discern the difference between what we can change and what we can’t. We made lists of things we can control and things we can’t. Here are some of the things we came up with.
Things we can control – our responses to things, the thermostat, prioritizing our bills, what we wear, the advice we give our children, what we do or think or say.
Things we can’t control – kittens, weather, the choices our children make, the economy, whether we get laid off, what other people do or think or say.
We concluded that generally we can control ourselves, and generally we can’t control everything else.
That seemed like an easy and quick guide to discerning the difference. We felt very wise!
Monday, March 7, 2011
The Doors of Change
In Open the Door, author Joyce Rupp uses the image of a door as a symbol of spiritual growth. In one chapter she quotes a poem written by a 12 year old girl named Mary Katherine Lidle. The day after she wrote this poem, Mary was killed in a car accident. Here is the last part of the poem.
Listen to me
Go through those doors with hope
Go through those doors knowing change is the future and you’re part of it
You don’t know what change is; that’s why you’re scared
Change is the sun booming over the horizon
Scattering rays of hope to a new day
Change is a baby lamb meeting the world for the first time
Change is growing from a young child to a young woman
Change is beautiful; you will learn to love it
I wonder if Mary’s spirit knew her life was going to change dramatically the next day. Did she write this poem to leave some comfort for her grieving family? Where did these words come from to be written by a 12 year old girl on the last day of her life?
Doors. Doors closing. Doors opening. Two of my children have made life changing choices in recent months. Choices I would not have made for them. Choices that are changing their lives and my life in some big ways. Change is booming. New opportunities beckon. It is beautiful. I am learning to love it.
I think I must let go. Must fear not, must be quiet so that my children can hear the Sound of Creation and dance the dance that is in them. –Russell Hoban
revised from archives
Listen to me
Go through those doors with hope
Go through those doors knowing change is the future and you’re part of it
You don’t know what change is; that’s why you’re scared
Change is the sun booming over the horizon
Scattering rays of hope to a new day
Change is a baby lamb meeting the world for the first time
Change is growing from a young child to a young woman
Change is beautiful; you will learn to love it
I wonder if Mary’s spirit knew her life was going to change dramatically the next day. Did she write this poem to leave some comfort for her grieving family? Where did these words come from to be written by a 12 year old girl on the last day of her life?
Doors. Doors closing. Doors opening. Two of my children have made life changing choices in recent months. Choices I would not have made for them. Choices that are changing their lives and my life in some big ways. Change is booming. New opportunities beckon. It is beautiful. I am learning to love it.
I think I must let go. Must fear not, must be quiet so that my children can hear the Sound of Creation and dance the dance that is in them. –Russell Hoban
revised from archives
Sunday, March 6, 2011
Shameless Self Promotion
I feel so lucky to have gotten a couple of things published recently. I hope you won’t mind if I share the news.
First, I wrote a story about my sons Dan and James that was published in an anthology titled A Cup of Comfort for Christian Women.
Second, I contributed to a website a few months ago about life lessons. I mentioned this site in an earlier post (The Secret of World Peace). The co-hosts of that site, Abubakar Jamil from Pakistan and Farnoosh Brock from Iran, then created an ebook titled Life Lessons: the Best Self Reflections from 108 Bloggers. Click on the title if you would like to see the book. If you want to read any author’s post, click on that author’s name. (I’m on the page with the sunflowers.) I hope you enjoy it!
First, I wrote a story about my sons Dan and James that was published in an anthology titled A Cup of Comfort for Christian Women.
Second, I contributed to a website a few months ago about life lessons. I mentioned this site in an earlier post (The Secret of World Peace). The co-hosts of that site, Abubakar Jamil from Pakistan and Farnoosh Brock from Iran, then created an ebook titled Life Lessons: the Best Self Reflections from 108 Bloggers. Click on the title if you would like to see the book. If you want to read any author’s post, click on that author’s name. (I’m on the page with the sunflowers.) I hope you enjoy it!
Friday, March 4, 2011
As It Is
“Expectations destroy our peace of mind, don’t they? They’re future disappointments planned out in advance.” –from A Place of Hiding by Elizabeth George
I remember when someone first mentioned the word autism in assessing my son. A few days later, as I was still trying to take that in, terrified about what it meant for my son and what it meant for me, feeling disoriented and desperate and in denial, a friend’s mother asked me, “So how do you feel about the fact that James won’t be going to Harvard?”
All these years later, I still marvel at her insensitivity. But that is not the point here. The point is that I did have expectations, perhaps not of Harvard, but of what life would be like for my son, what life would be like for me as his mother.
I did not relinquish those expectations without a fight. I fought for years. I fought for the hopes and dreams and fantasies I was so attached to that I couldn’t imagine what life would be like if I gave them up. I fought so hard to get away from what was real, that I caused a lot of unnecessary pain – to myself, to James, and to others.
On the outside, I was being a good advocate for James. I tried every possible therapy, took advantage of every special ed service, consulted with an array of experts, and read a library full of books. But on the inside I was simply trying to escape, to escape the pain of loving my child so fiercely and so helplessly. I was trying to make reality something other than what it was. In retrospect, I think my denial and my efforts to control something I couldn’t control caused me more suffering that the autism itself.
Expectations are not really bad. We do hope for things and anticipate things. We make goals and we strive to attain them. We expect certain outcomes to result from certain efforts. And when our expectations are disappointed, we are sad.
But then sometimes we increase and prolong our suffering because of our attachment to our expectations, our unwillingness to acknowledge that things did not turn out the way we wanted, our quickness to blame someone or something, our refusal to grieve and move on.
This year, I had expectations. I had plans and hopes and dreams and fantasies, all of which brought me considerable delight in anticipation. And then, in the blink of an eye, things changed. But this time I was better prepared. My first reaction was to remind myself that I didn’t know if this new direction was good or bad. My second reaction was to realize that it was neither. It simply was.
It is as it is
And as it is
Is as it should be
I went up to my cabin last weekend. I wrote a list of all my expectations that are now not going to happen. I described them in all the glowing perfection that only fantasies can have. And then I placed the paper in the fire and blessed them as they went up in smoke. I let them go. And turned to face a new beginning.
So when you feel all the endings coming ... begin looking for all the beginnings. –Ann Voskamp
I remember when someone first mentioned the word autism in assessing my son. A few days later, as I was still trying to take that in, terrified about what it meant for my son and what it meant for me, feeling disoriented and desperate and in denial, a friend’s mother asked me, “So how do you feel about the fact that James won’t be going to Harvard?”
All these years later, I still marvel at her insensitivity. But that is not the point here. The point is that I did have expectations, perhaps not of Harvard, but of what life would be like for my son, what life would be like for me as his mother.
I did not relinquish those expectations without a fight. I fought for years. I fought for the hopes and dreams and fantasies I was so attached to that I couldn’t imagine what life would be like if I gave them up. I fought so hard to get away from what was real, that I caused a lot of unnecessary pain – to myself, to James, and to others.
On the outside, I was being a good advocate for James. I tried every possible therapy, took advantage of every special ed service, consulted with an array of experts, and read a library full of books. But on the inside I was simply trying to escape, to escape the pain of loving my child so fiercely and so helplessly. I was trying to make reality something other than what it was. In retrospect, I think my denial and my efforts to control something I couldn’t control caused me more suffering that the autism itself.
Expectations are not really bad. We do hope for things and anticipate things. We make goals and we strive to attain them. We expect certain outcomes to result from certain efforts. And when our expectations are disappointed, we are sad.
But then sometimes we increase and prolong our suffering because of our attachment to our expectations, our unwillingness to acknowledge that things did not turn out the way we wanted, our quickness to blame someone or something, our refusal to grieve and move on.
This year, I had expectations. I had plans and hopes and dreams and fantasies, all of which brought me considerable delight in anticipation. And then, in the blink of an eye, things changed. But this time I was better prepared. My first reaction was to remind myself that I didn’t know if this new direction was good or bad. My second reaction was to realize that it was neither. It simply was.
It is as it is
And as it is
Is as it should be
I went up to my cabin last weekend. I wrote a list of all my expectations that are now not going to happen. I described them in all the glowing perfection that only fantasies can have. And then I placed the paper in the fire and blessed them as they went up in smoke. I let them go. And turned to face a new beginning.
So when you feel all the endings coming ... begin looking for all the beginnings. –Ann Voskamp
Wednesday, March 2, 2011
Man Plans, God Laughs (Yiddish Proverb)
If you don’t have children, you might still be under the delusion that you can control things. Children are God’s cure for this. I think of children as God’s 12 step program for control addicts.
When I adopted my daughter, I consulted a friend who is a renowned astrologer. She contemplated Mia’s chart and frowned. “Are you sure this is the correct birth date?” she asked. It was, as far as I knew. She started fidgeting, her eyes darting around the room as if looking for a quick escape. She stared at the chart as if willing it to change. She cleared her throat several times. “What?!” I finally erupted, making her jump. “What is it?”
“Well,” she said, desperate for some way to soften what she saw, “let’s just say your daughter is...well, beyond programming.”
That doesn’t mean I didn’t try. I had controlled things all my life. I thought I had to control things or things would not happen the way they were supposed to happen. But being in control required a lot of energy and vigilance. Eventually I wore myself out. Like a rock chip on a windshield, cracks lengthened and branched out over my delusion of control. Finally I asked myself, “What makes me think I know how things should happen?”
Here is one of my favorite passages. It’s from Another Roadside Attraction by Tom Robbins.
Down by the waterfall, Amanda pitched her tent – it was made of willow sticks and the wool of black goats. Having filled the tent with her largest and softest paisley cushions, Amanda stripped down to her beads and panties and fell into a trance. “I shall determine how to prolong the lives of butterflies,” she had previously announced.
However, an hour later when she awoke, she smiled mysteriously. “The life-span of the butterfly is precisely the right length,” she said.
Over time I surrendered. I became wise in the ways of control. I had none. And it was good.
If you don’t have children yet or don’t plan to have children, but you still seek enlightenment, get a cat.
revised from archives
When I adopted my daughter, I consulted a friend who is a renowned astrologer. She contemplated Mia’s chart and frowned. “Are you sure this is the correct birth date?” she asked. It was, as far as I knew. She started fidgeting, her eyes darting around the room as if looking for a quick escape. She stared at the chart as if willing it to change. She cleared her throat several times. “What?!” I finally erupted, making her jump. “What is it?”
“Well,” she said, desperate for some way to soften what she saw, “let’s just say your daughter is...well, beyond programming.”
That doesn’t mean I didn’t try. I had controlled things all my life. I thought I had to control things or things would not happen the way they were supposed to happen. But being in control required a lot of energy and vigilance. Eventually I wore myself out. Like a rock chip on a windshield, cracks lengthened and branched out over my delusion of control. Finally I asked myself, “What makes me think I know how things should happen?”
Here is one of my favorite passages. It’s from Another Roadside Attraction by Tom Robbins.
Down by the waterfall, Amanda pitched her tent – it was made of willow sticks and the wool of black goats. Having filled the tent with her largest and softest paisley cushions, Amanda stripped down to her beads and panties and fell into a trance. “I shall determine how to prolong the lives of butterflies,” she had previously announced.
However, an hour later when she awoke, she smiled mysteriously. “The life-span of the butterfly is precisely the right length,” she said.
Over time I surrendered. I became wise in the ways of control. I had none. And it was good.
If you don’t have children yet or don’t plan to have children, but you still seek enlightenment, get a cat.
revised from archives
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