TROUBLE

Trouble creates a capacity to handle it,
meet it as a friend,
for you'll see a lot of it and had
better be on speaking terms with it.

Oliver Wendell Holmes


We don't always see the opportunity for personal growth when life's troubles appear and seem to produce anything but stress and negativity.

Today I'm grateful to feel grief and loss on the anniversary of my husband's death, otherwise I would have never had the pleasure of his company in my life. Rather than continuing to feel negative, I'm choosing to ponder my personal growth since he's been gone . . . and realize that I have so much personal progress to be grateful for . . . as well as having the rest of my life to look forward to.

Today is the first day
of the rest of my life

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Courage

Courage is the greatest of all the virtues.
Because if you haven’t courage, you may not
have an opportunity to use any of the others.

Samuel Johnson

There have been days when getting out of bed took courage. In my greatest depths of depression, my energy was totally sapped . . . it will do that to you.

Have you ever been through
one of those phases of life?

Dealing with death does that to me . . . the grief saps me of all energy to keep going. In my opinion, grief is a form of depression . . . I recognized the signs when one of my best friends died recently . . . that feeling of no energy consumed me and felt so familiar.

Going through the motions of putting one foot in front of the other to walk is a monumental task in these times. Many think that some of these symptoms that are felt is merely the “depressed” person being lazy.

The misconceptions associated with mental health are cruel and lack compassion . . . this is the attitude that keeps a depressed person in the depths of depression when the emotional support that is so needed is not there, especially if they are made to feel like they are “worthless,” leaving them feeling even more helpless with lower self-esteem. It is a vicious cycle.

It is not a conscious effort to physically do nothing, but the emotional state of the depressed person almost makes the simplest things in life impossible. I have referred to “getting up when I fall down” in previous posts . . . that one thing is the most difficult to do when physically and emotionally, there is no energy in order to get up.

What it takes to overcome the depths of depression is inner strength and courage to go against that energy, fight it with everything within you, get up and keep going. As time goes by, I have learned the longer you stay down, the harder it becomes to get back up. At least that is how I see it, having been through it several times in my life.

Life changes, losses and bad circumstances will take you to that dark place, not just grief. There are all types of losses that feel like death . . . for example, divorce or loss of a job. It is the disruption of a lifestyle.

We are living in times of trouble and should exercise compassion with those close to us going through a difficult time . . . emotions are very fragile in those times of lifestyle changes.

I’ll close with these words . . . never say “get over it” to someone having a difficult time.

How have you dealt with a
difficult situation in life?

What are your coping mechanisms?

How do you maintain peace and
contentment in bad times?

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A new years resolution

I’m alive again with the imaginary “new beginning” that a new year brings, along with a new challenge, standing on my own two feet, no longer complacent with money in the bank to keep me a hermit . . . no longer JR’s wife living in the past as if waiting to hear the sound of his keys unlocking the door, coming home from a day at work. One of my New Year resolutions . . . put the past behind me and I made a big step toward that at the first of the year.

Time to truly live again.

Although I am still wearing the gold chain he wore, his wedding ring has joined my wedding rings in a safe place and no longer on the gold chain. I’ll never forget him and the beautiful life we shared, but he is gone and it is finally time to move on. I’m grateful every day that his presence in my life gives me hope that there are still good guys in this world and they are supposed to be difficult to find because they are like treasures.

It was one of the most emotional decisions I have made in a very long time. I thought about it as new year resolutions were on my mind, as usual in December. The difficulty was breaking a promise to JR . . . to wear the gold chain with his wedding ring around my neck until my new soulmate would take it off. At the time I told him to not even talk of such things, but he had to take off his jewelry as he settled in at the hospital emergency room which led us into that conversation.

He passed away the following morning.

In six years, I took it off once to take x-rays and that was after begging them to not make me take it off. It was an obsession and I was haunted by the fact that I briefly took it off, feeling that I would be punished for breaking the promise. Tears filled my eyes as I took off the chain.

What I didn’t realize is that the promise has haunted me . . . a reminder that I remain alone in life without a partner, waiting to fulfill the ceremonial changing of my love loyalty. It has tormented me as I have replayed that time in the emergency room when the thought of another man was the furthest thing from my mind.

He’s gone . . . never coming back . . . the emotional tie became so psychological as time has passed . . . I would catch myself playing with it, putting it on my finger . . . a nervous habit which accelerated when I quit smoking . . . too much of a symbolic tie to him. I was holding on as if my life depended on it . . . subconsciously waiting for him to come back. I had to finally let go and take it off as the new year began, fulfilling one of my new year resolutions. Now I feel completely free and at peace to move on with my life.

Perhaps I will never move on, finding love again and living happily ever after with a new soulmate, rather finding fulfillment in work, hobbies and just enjoying what life has to offer. My faith in God’s destiny for me has to do with finding peace, love and happiness with my life . . . not necessarily another soulmate.

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Loving the joys in life

A simple thing like having my computer back to almost normal after being hit with a nasty virus that took months, weeks and lots of patience to get rid of has made me a deliriously happy person today. I knock on wood and say a little prayer as I say that I got rid of it . . . I thought I had been rid of it before and it came creeping back to wreak more havoc.

Since my computer is where I make a living and I have been broke, I had to be inventive and figure out ways to attack this virus as I did not have the money to go out and buy another computer or a hard drive . . . or even take it to someone to fix.

My stubborn determination paid off for me this time, although my computer system is a complete mess. I’ll figure it out and learn something new at the same time . . . I’m not a computer systems geek, just a general computer geek.

When the challenge made me angry enough to find the way, I treated it as a game . . . the computer virus had to be defeated. As I sit at my computer working and finally able to play music again, I feel the satisfaction of accomplishment . . . and the music has brought me so much more joy today than in the past when it was an ordinary thing in my life.

Sure, I have been majorly bummed out about having these computer problems compounded by the accidental death of a close friend, slow internet sales and no steady job with benefits . . . BUT I try to be aware of and grateful for the little things that bring joy to my life and know that I will be touched with many little joys that bring a smile to my face.

It is called simple abundance. Finding joy in those little things in life make the big struggles tolerable. Since adopting this lifestyle way over a decade ago, my life has changed from the career woman who drove home in tears every night after a day of work. I’ll take smiles and just getting by over lots of money and tears any day. It is a choice of a simple lifestyle and realizing that ordinary can be awesome.

The downward spiral of the economy has found many of us in a bad place in life and I am so grateful that I have learned how to cope with the obstacles by loving the joys in life which brings peace to my soul.

Tomorrow is another day and I feel awesome changes are coming in my life.

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An open heart in a sad world

Dealing with the death of a close friend has been a difficult endeavor this week. Grief is an emotion that is the most difficult that I have ever encountered in my life and no matter how many times I have had to cope and go through these feelings, it seems to become more difficult.

Since JR died six years ago, four people that I was close to in my life have passed away. Every time I have tried to play the mind game of the “celebration of their life”. Sure, I celebrate the life of everyone who has touched my life . . . but the ones who are gone . . . they have vanished from this earth in the blink of an eye. One of my biggest problems on this earth is coming to terms with death . . . it freaks me out when those close to me disappear from my life.

As a Christian with strong faith, death should not be a problem that I have to deal with so emotionally. It is a fact of life that we all have to face . . . and it happens every day. Death never stops, just as birth doesn’t stop . . . life evolves. My death does not scare me at all . . . the problem is the death of those close to me.

The world as we know it becomes sadder by the day . . . I am slowly getting away from listening to the news. My heart is always open and I have been blessed with way too much compassion for human suffering. Death is one thing, the end of suffering for the person who died, but suffering in its many forms . . . there is a burden in my heart for the problems unfolding before our very eyes.

Although I needed to verbalize what was going through my head tonight, I also have faith in mankind. The problems our society is experiencing is the tip of an iceberg, the suffering has just begun . . . but I believe it will make us less selfish, more giving, more compassionate as a society . . . perhaps ultimately happier individuals for making a difference in the lives of others as we help each other get through bad times.

An open heart in a sad world is not a bad thing . . . an open heart is one that feels, reacts and makes a difference. In my exploration of peace, love and happiness, compassion for your fellow man is a beautiful part of “peace” . . .

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Tragic society

The news of more and more foreclosures, rising unemployment and general financial disasters has made me wonder when things would start getting really crazy as society becomes so distraught, feeling like they are pushed against the wall with nowhere to go.

It occurred to me tonight that the tragedies have begun and we need to be aware of those close to us . . . you never know what a person or a family is going through.

In recent news I read of a man who froze to death in his home . . . his electricity had been turned off. Didn’t anyone know he was in that situation? An act of kindness as simple as a ride to a local shelter so he could sleep in a warm room and the man would be alive today. It reminded me of a news story I heard a year or two ago where a man was dead in his house for months, maybe even a year . . . and no one knew . . .

Another story hit me as so tragic today . . . a man and his wife both lost their jobs . . . they were found shot to death in their home, along with their children . . . murder/suicide. The story of why was faxed to the local television station before the deaths occurred.

It is tragic desperation . . . I don’t believe in the government bailing out society when money does not grow on trees and “society” is becoming financially devastated and unemployed . . . where does it end? We, as a society, must start helping each other in little ways that will make a difference.

There is always coping with life and a way out of a situation . . . time and faith for starters. Death is not the way, although sometimes I think the ones not having to go through the type of struggles our society is embarking upon are the peaceful souls as we are entering into a time in our world that is a form of hell on earth. We will soon hear these stories with daily frequency and become more desensitized than we already are.

While I can understand the mentality of being distraught, I also know that if we take a moment at a time, think about the situation, reach out to each other, draw closer together . . . there is nothing we can’t do as a society . . . we have no choice but to help each other survive.

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Unconditional love

Unconditional love is a concept that means showing love towards someone regardless of his or her actions or beliefs. It is a concept comparable to true love, a term which is more frequently used to describe love between lovers. By contrast unconditional love is frequently used to describe love between family members, comrades in arms and between others in highly committed relationships. It has also been used in a religious context to describe God’s love for mankind.

When my husband died, I was left with an overwhelming feeling of unconditional love that will never fade away, it will never die and no one will ever be able to take it away from me. It is the most beautiful gift anyone has ever given me and I will cherish it and take care of those memories for as long as I live, no matter what happens or who I spend the rest of my life with. His love for me is part of who I am and one reason I am such a hopeless romantic . . . I felt it and lived it.

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The experience of survival

In the midst of a time of turmoil, stress, uncertainty all you want to do is be able to make it through . . . survive it . . . although it usually feels like the bad vibes will never go away and nothing will ever feel “normal” again.

I am still not feeling “normal” every day and it could also be that my heart keeps getting broken and disappointed on top of a heart that still grieves for JR, even after six years that he passed away.

Logic and reason has nothing to do with what the heart experiences, feels so deeply and it goes from day to day in the survival mode. Seems like looking at the past years in retrospect, my heart has been surviving one thing after another when the greatest promise for my life to finally come together presented itself last year after going through my first online heartbreak. Maybe the lesson that should be learned is to not jump from the frying pan to the fire.

Although my heart longs to be loved again with the intensity of my happy marriage to JR that was the real thing in my life that continues to give me hope . . . the real and true love that we had for each other, the respect and honesty we shared that is so necessary for a long term relationship . . . I’ve put love on the back burner. It scares me now, but not forever, just now.

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Another beautiful ending

Sometimes when I am feeling strong positive vibes with abounding faith, it seems like the powers that be want to test me.

One of my best friends died in an accident today . . . sudden death. At least it happened fast and he didn’t feel the trauma of death upon him, although he had an accident a couple of months ago that had him in rehabilitation for months. He was just starting to feel “normal” again.

When someone close to me dies suddenly, I go through the shock and asking God why. This guy was always the first one to help out his neighbors in a crisis. Just a week or so ago, he bought one of his friends a used car because “he needed it and didn’t have the means to buy it himself”. He was everyone’s angel who came to the rescue of anyone who needed assistance.

My husband now has one of his best friends to keep him company in heaven . . . two of the good guys while there are murderers, thieves, terrorists and bad people in general running around this earth.

Another beautiful ending in my life. While I know that God has his own plan, I am left to continue living this life with lots of faith that everything is going to be ok. 

Just the other night, we discussed the state of the world and he told me we would all be ok if we stuck together.  We all need angels too . . .

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The gift of today

There is a saying I’ve heard that yesterday is in the past, tomorrow is the future, but today is a gift, that is why it is called the present.

Having to deal with the sudden death of my spouse has resulted in my belief that although we must be responsible in this life, we also must live for the moment. It isn’t the quantity of years that we live, but the quality of those years we live that truly matter.

Quality of life issues became so important to me when I left the corporate world. When I experienced the difference, all of a sudden money did not matter. What mattered was the joy that freedom brought me. I didn’t realize how crazy chasing more money was making me.

The peace of simple abundance is what mattered, raising the quality of our lives. It was one of the first things that I thought of when JR died, how much it made him happy to have me be a housewife and spoil him. I would never trade those years for all the money in the world . . . those last years of his life were truly quality years for both of us.

Celebrate the gift of today and live for the moment.

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Peace, Love and Happiness

Three simple words that have so much meaning.

Those words take me back to flower child days that weave through the tapestry of my life through good and bad times. Together they sum up my philosophy of life having nothing to do with politics which lead me from one day to the next with optimism and faith that is much like wearing rose colored glasses . . . the romance of life.

My blog is an exploration of those three words with their differing meanings and finding that place in life that is filled with peace, love and happiness all at one time.

A new adventure began for me as a beautiful life abruptly ended. One of life’s ironies is that most people don’t appreciate or even know what they have until it is gone. Another irony of life is knowing that everything happens for a reason and part of the adventure is finding the good in bad times.

I’m a widow on my journey back to a “normal” life. It is difficult to actually define “normal” except to say that it is the beautiful emotion that comes from the harmony of peace, love and happiness.

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