Category: aggravations

Life unexpected

by worrylessjourney, posted in aggravations, anxiety, coping, danger, frustration, God, patterns, viewpoint, weather, worry

unexpectedYesterday I wrote about the challenges in the last year and that I hope we are heading for a break. So that’s what I thought? Guess again. Now with plans to leave my home in coastal Georgia and travel to Florida there are three storms in the Atlantic! I just want to yell at God and say “GIVE ME A BREAK!” By the way, it is ok to yell at God. He can take it.

So now we are watching hurricanes and hoping that we get a miss. My brother-in-law  will be with our dogs. He is flying in tomorrow. I bet he wished he had never agreed to this!

Well, life goes on and we cannot control mother nature.

I am sharing a poem I wrote about life:

Life (1)

Life is very strange                                                                                                                                 its patterns like                                                                                                                                       paisley swirl on fabric

blending colors and shapes                                                                                                                  our life takes strange twists                                                                                                                   unexpected directions

and we are unable to see                                                                                                                       the form from within the design                                                                                                         our viewing point

deep in the weave                                                                                                                                   we can only see                                                                                                                                       one color at a time

and cannot know                                                                                                                                     the beauty                                                                                                                                                 of the whole

and even though God allows                                                                                                                us to choose colors and patterns                                                                                                         he alone can see the beautiful design

A Challenging time

by worrylessjourney, posted in aggravations, anxiety, choices, coping, emotions, healing, hope, life changes, medical

climbing

It looks as if we are coming to the end of a long journey. My husband knew his knee needed help August a year ago. He saw an orthopedist who scheduled surgery for January…quite a wait. The road to this surgery was rocky. As a nurse I think the physician did not want to do this surgery since for the next four months he came up with one hurdle after another. Feeling this was not the right path we cancelled and made an appointment with the Mayo Clinic. We had to wait until June for an appointment but since then things have gone smoothly and his surgery will be next Tuesday.

This has been a long journey for us both. The knee fix is complex and we are definitely at the right place. We have both had to endure stress, frustration and a worsening of my husband’s pain.

The year also posed some family crises and other stressful times. The good news is that, God willing, we are heading to some healing.

what will beThe other good news is that in spite of all the things this year put in front of me I got through it. There have been some times of anxiety and physical symptoms but each one was conquered and I was able to move on. Writing helped and I find that it is an outlet for the things that come up day to day.  It will continue to be my place for reflection and ideas. It is a joy to have others read and respond.

Now I will face the next week with the hope that all will go well. Then we can begin the process of picking up the pieces and moving forward.

 

Do children feel secure?

by worrylessjourney, posted in aggravations, anxiety, children, consequences, danger, electronic devices, family, mistakes, parenting, safety, suicide, unconditional love

Today at lunch with friends we were told about a family who lost a 10 year old son to suicide. He shot himself in the head. Later the family lost another son to drugs. This is a loving family and their relatives say there was nothing wrong with their childhood. The younger child was bullied and I don’t think the other son ever got over his brother’s death.

media

It scares me that suicides are occurring in such young children. It’s hard to know why. I know that our exposure to so much data may be part of the answer. A child growing up when there was no media would probably never know anyone who committed suicide and certainly would not be bullied on line. There was some bullying in school when I was a child but it was nipped in the bud by the teachers. This was also the era when parents believed the teacher and usually there was some sort of punishment to follow for the child. Things have really changed.

Now we are so exposed to all the terrible events around the world that to take a gun and shoot oneself or someone else is not unusual. Exposure desensitizes us.

There is so much anxiety and depression in children. I have mentioned that I see it as being related to parenting in such a way that children do not have a safe base….a place where there are rules and secure love. Children need limits. No limits is a scary thing. It means that no one cares what you do. No one loves you enough to set limits for you.

safe child

I can see some changes in parenting recently and I hope that the changes are for the better. I so want to see children grow up loved and secure.

OOPS!

by worrylessjourney, posted in aggravations, anxiety, choices, complacency, consequences, coping, frustration, learn, Live!, mistakes

oopsIt is amazing to me how closely linked my anxiety is to my IBSD. There is a connected pathway between the two. It goes both ways. For the last few days I was really stupid and didn’t take some of my medicines.  The results were what you would expect. I ended up with a bad episode. It’s what happens when you get disorganized and don’t follow your regimen. Now I’m suffering for it.

brain-hacking-101-6-638

It shows how life goes along just fine and then we ignore what we need and we bear the results. I know there are people who don’t deal with issues such as this but no one is perfect and they have other things to deal with. Life is never perfect and we would be bored to death if it were. It would be like living in Pleasantville (old movie). Nothing changed and life was desperately ordinary.

pleasantville1a_756_426_81_s

Sometimes it is hard to cope with the things that plague us but most of the time I can see other problems that I wouldn’t want. I once went to a lecture where the presenter asked everyone to write their biggest problem on a piece of paper and pass it to the front. She then asked who wanted to come up and take someone else’s problem. No one did. Like it or not we have a relationship with ourselves and have developed the coping skills to mitigate our health issues.

Each of us has the life we have been given and our purpose is to make the best of it that we can. This means continuing to learn, grow and live!

Closer or further apart?

by worrylessjourney, posted in aggravations, anxiety, change, connections, consequences, danger, divided world, fear, hope, misunderstanding, understanding, worry
I was remembering this song by the Kingston Trio from my college days.. 1960’s.
They’re rioting in Africa
They’re starving in Spain
There’s hurricanes in Florida
And Texas needs rain
The whole world is festering with unhappy souls
The french hate the Germans, the Germans hate the Poles
Italians hate Yugoslavs, South Africans hate the Dutch
And I don’t like anybody very much!!
But we can be tranquil and thankful and proud
For man’s been endowed with a mushroom-shaped cloud
And we know for certain that some lovely day
Someone will set the spark off
And we will all be blown away!!
They’re rioting in Africa
There’s strife in Iran
What nature doesn’t so to us
Will be done by our fellow man
scary world 1
The sad part about this song is that is it still true. The line: The whole world is festering with unhappy souls, especially strikes me. It is so sad that song was written over 50 years ago and nothing has changed. I guess at the time I really thought that the world would be a better place but it’s possible that it is worse.
It does seem logical that with the enormous population growth and the availability of information at our fingertips we would either draw closer together or further apart. Maybe both things are happening. (if you can hold two opposite things at once)
japanIf only our accessibility to the world would grant us better understanding. If the population continues to grow at this rate we will have to learn to live together or die out. My daughter lived in Japan for a while and experienced the way that people living in such juxtaposition to each other have learned to manage by their awareness of personal space and their ability to center down into themselves among others.
We have to learn new ways to love and accept each other. Life depends on it.
love-one-another-john-13-34-eloise-schneider

Moderates are extinct

by worrylessjourney, posted in aggravations, aging, anger, change, complacency, freedom, intelligence, politics

In America the president reigns for four years and journalism governs for ever and ever.-—Oscar Wilde

I am constantly frustrated by the fact that the press in so biased. I don’t care if you are right or left politically. It doesn’t matter. Either way you are bombarded with news that is so slanted as to be unbelievable. I am not sure but that the press rules the country.

I am a moderate in thinking, and I hope, action. I am almost extinct. A creature dying out. It seems that there is no one concerned about what is best for this country or its people but only that their opinion rules.

ripextinct

Elected officials used to vote on issues based on its merits. That doesn’t happen any more. We no longer have statesmen, only politicians. I know that our founding fathers and spinning in their graves. They imagined a congress where people left their jobs temporarily and served for a short time and returned home. Now we have members who have been there for many, many years.

The government has totally lost judgment, responsibility and critical thinking. I would bet that the most intelligent and moral individuals would run the other way if asked to serve.I hope that somehow reason raises its head but I have my doubts. The country seems to be dumbing down on knowledge and entertainment is king.

Now I have had my rant for the day.

I hope the rest of your week-end is wonderful!

 

Learning to see yourself

by worrylessjourney, posted in aggravations, anxiety, appearance, belief, connections, feelings, learn, viewpoint, wholeness

It is really sad that our culture wants to find ways to put people down. They are too fat, too thin, too poor, strangely enough- too rich, too sad, too ugly, too drunk all the time….I could go on and on. My experience over the years has been that those judgments are made to move the viewer up one notch…..”I am not that fat, thin, old, ugly….etc. By comparing myself with you I can make myself feel better. The actual problem lies with their own self esteem.

improve-self-esteem_03

We each want to feel good about ourselves and in some part it can be enhanced by how others see us. We all need positive affirmation. We especially need someone who can reflect our goodness back to us. We are communal people and yes,  we want others to like us.

Only someone who is totally secure in themselves can survive without affirmation. It is the rare person who can achieve that kind of security in themselves. (or someone who is a narcissist or a sociopath)

All of this is why we need to stay with those who support and uphold us. People who tear us down and are negative need to be let go. We don’t need that in our lives. Some people can seem to be supportive but are really undermining your self esteem in subtle ways. Beware of them. They are probably the most subversive and worm their way in by seeming kind. Turn away from them.

images (1)We grow and strive toward acceptance of ourselves and if we are blessed we achieve some achievement of that as we grow older. I almost think it takes age for us to realize our own worth and not depend so much on others. If we do it earlier we are rare.

 

Learning to understand and appreciate ourselves and our abilities is a lifelong journey. Each life lesson brings us closer. Keep learning and growing.

Shoulds

by worrylessjourney, posted in aggravations, anxiety, belief, change, coping, guilt, habits, life changes, memories, patterns

How often in life do we hear the word “should?” For most of us our parents taught us there are some things we “should’ do and some things we ‘shouldn’t’ do. Those “shoulds” get caught up in our brains and spend time telling us what to do. Sometimes they are good thoughts but sometimes they are not. The “shoulds” can start to run/ruin our life.

'If you can't control your temper,sister,you shouldn't be playing this game!'“Shoulds” can also come from the outside. We often hear someone say “she “shouldn’t” do that.” Unfortunately we can be very quick to “should” someone. The word is used to tell us what some people think is the right thing. It is a form of judgement.

We have a lot of “shoulds” stored up in our brains. They can be very hard to get rid of. As a simple example when I was a child we “shouldn’t” wear white shoes before Easter and not after Labor Day. This very funny one has been hard for me to let go. I always think about it even though I live in the south and it is hot through September and we need to keep wearing summer clothes. (that edict also had to do with white pants and skirts) I no longer follow that “should” but I can’t get it out of my mind.

healWe have to learn to recognize when our programming is getting in the way of our living. The things that no longer apply or work need to be rooted out. We have to take a good look at the things from the past that make us feel guilty about what we do now. If those old “shoulds” are getting in the way they have to go. The trick is to recognize them. Find them and let them go!

Can we learn to really listen?

by worrylessjourney, posted in aggravations, balance, compassion, habits, listen, speak, think, try, viewpoint, wisdom

Listen or your tongue will keep you deaf.   Native American Proverb

listenintg-dogFor an extrovert this is a very important statement. I am always ready to talk and I have to curb myself to really listen. Most of us instead of listening are thinking of the next thing we want to say. I still have to hold my tongue and let others share.

I once visited a convent where there was a rule about discussion. Everyone sat at a table and one person spoke at a time. After that there was silence for several minutes. Then it was someone else’s time to speak. That silence left moments for the digestion of what had been said and time to reflect on what you might say that had importance for the discussion. Many conclusions were easily reached as there was little unimportant information shared.

In social situations I can really get carried away but I am working at it. I am getting better at listening. However, I know that I am not always bad at it as people have come to me for solace or advice my whole life. I do seem to know when listening is critical.

The big difference I see at my age is that I am unafraid to speak about matters that are important and frequently avoided. I will speak out for those who are in need of a voice. There are times when this is not appreciated but I never do it in anger or an emotional state. Important things need to be spoken of calmly and rationally. Listening to others in this kind of discussion is also critical and not easy. Emotions can be triggered and I have had to learn when to just back away.

speak carefully

My father (who was amazing) used to say: put your brain in gear before you put your mouth in motion. 

Another good proverb

Aggravating!

by worrylessjourney, posted in aggravations, consequences, frustration, questioning

I don’t know if anyone has noticed but it is almost impossible to open the things you buy in the store. Some foods come in packages that are supposed to open easily but I invariably end up getting a knife or some scissors. The plastic that items are encased in won’t even open with scissors. Sometimes I think I’m just supposed to look at the item and not ever open it.

plastic

The other day I tried to open the casing for an-over-the counter pill. If it had been something that I needed quickly I would have never gotten it. It actually had tiny lines with a tiny pair of scissors shown so that you knew it took scissors to open it but it would also have taken the world’s tiniest scissors. I finally punched a hole in it with a seam ripper used for sewing.

I begin to think I could use a set of medical tools like scalpels and forceps to get into packages. If this is supposed to keep us from stealing things then they will need bigger packaging so that it can’t be secreted away in my bag.

circle

There should be a place in Dante’s hell for the people who make these packages!