Turn Your Troubles into Blessings
December 1, 2017
The more I become open to the ideas that “everything happens for a reason” and “others are a mirror for my beliefs” I see those playing out on my life’s stage constantly!
Sometimes I now catch myself while feeling upset or blaming someone realizing that I have the option to reflect on how that person might be mirroring something in me that I can’t love about myself. I realize that I might have the choice to live that behavior in them and in so doing love that in myself too.
November 29, 2017
In our 47 consecutive days of watching the sunrise, today’s is the most unique. All grayness. Still beautiful in its subtlety, yet most different from my sunrise stereotype. A message for me about forming expectations and judging certain qualities as good or bad. Do I focus on what’s missing? Perhaps indulging in gray can be beneficial. One friend said she likes gray days. They are more restful.
Step Six of the Thirteen steps asks “Are you willing to release your need to judge the situation as either right or wrong good or bad? Even if you can’t explain how can you simply allow the situation to be perfect just the way it is?” The gray sunrise reminds me of Step Six.
November 27th, 2017
Witness an unfolding journey of my heart:
Upset
November 25, 2017
“Love to all today. I celebrate your family fullness in my heart.” What I did not send to my adult kids today.
I feel unworthy to share this sentiment and all the turmoil of my heart as my children gather with their dad’s family for a cousin’s wedding. The feeling of separation and exclusion is not new. Heart connection was always tenuous with the inlaws, and twenty-five years into the marriage, exclusion was clearly stated. At that time, I legally had the right to be there. Ten years later, divorce just makes it official. Exclusion is now proper and justified.
But, I still feel sad, as I did while still legally included.
November 25, 2017
What if I created a service that I need myself?
A S.T.O.R.Y. (Sustained Tale of Repressed Yearning, or “Old Story”) hotline. I want to call in right now and have my story witnessed and validated. Do my crying, then be guided in the 13-steps.
Would this appeal to you?!!
What would you gladly pay for this service?
November 22, 2107
Today marks the 4oth consecutive day John and I have watched the sunrise! I continue to be enthralled by the variation of colors, light patterns, even suspense level in the daily display of this dependable phenomenon. Can I be, or can my life be, like the sunrise? Reliable, colorfully 
variable, always worth getting up for?
Well, I know having the sun to watch every morning can give my life that encouraging quality! What’s occurring to me as I reflect on this is the idea that I would like to be someone to be counted on with a message that discovering and choosing one’s unique fulfillment is something worth getting up for every day. I want to be colorful, varied, maybe even suspenseful, with sharing my experiences of walking in Nature using the tools of Radical Forgiveness as a path to fulfillment. That would be my fulfillment.
November 20, 2017
Thanks for reading! I love delving into my life’s journey with the tools of Radical Forgiveness. Using the tools often helps me love myself having my feelings and using them to open my heart to myself and others. When that happens, I have more energy to get things done and to create in many different ways. I can relate with others more easily too! I’m much calmer in crises and can listen to others’ drama without having to get caught up in it myself.
For comparison, Thanksgiving Day reminds me of how I used to be and how I know my life is better now. At a family Thanksgiving gathering, my sister made a comment about my tofu dish. My stuffed anger and shame exploded and I threw the glass casserole dish to the floor. Crash!
November 15, 2017
What would I feel when I crossed that road, meeting the spot where I had left the trail two years before? When I got there I could celebrate having walked all 2,175 miles of the Appalachian Trail. The spot lacked the drama of Mt. Katahdin or Springer Mountain, the geographic endpoints of the trail. My completion point was the crossing of VA state route 624, near Catawba. There’s no sign or plaque, no natural landmark or feature. Just white blazes on both sides indicating that the trail continues in both directions.
November 7, 2017
“It’s really not coming up! It’s just like that story I read my boys about how the sun was brought back to the sky!”
On our 25th consecutive day of sunrise watching, there were no colors and no orb to be seen! Sunrise time was 6:09, and at 6:13 we had still seen no pink or gold and no disk either. Just gray clouds with a few slits of light!
I thought, “This gives me all kinds of permission to take a break from shining in my own life, well, at least every once in a while, like maybe once in twenty-five days!” Don’t get me wrong, it was still beautiful in a subtle way, but different! Here’s my photo:
November 2, 2017
Satori magic with my partner. Those beliefs! Every time, what I pick fits the situation. This time, we both started with current stories from our day. Mine was “I need to give support without receiving support.”
When I drew my “Event” card from the game deck, it said, “You were made to be the scapegoat.” Oh yes, there it was! He had said I had gotten HIM all riled up. We were a perfect match for the game. Actually, it was a challenge for me to stay in it, I had such a charge about being blamed!
October 31, 2017
John and I have watched the sunrise together for 18 consecutive days! I had requested of him that we do something special and unique together, something that sets our partnership apart and becomes a sort of ritual. He suggested observing the sunrise together first on October 14, my second day back at work in the Visitor Center here in Anza-Borrego Desert State Park in southern California. That’s an easy thing to do where we live in employee housing. Just a fifty-yard walk from our house we can get an expansive view of the horizon! We’ve discovered that the sunrise is unique every day! The colors and clouds play with each other differently in combinations and patterns that astound us anew each day. We’ve also noticed that the effects of the sunrise, light playing on the east facing mountains, varies markedly as well! The mountains just west of our house catch the magenta pink glow of the first light. We have to watch carefully, though, because sometimes the pink begins a partial minute before the sun shines above the horizon. Sometimes, it appears at exactly the same time. One morning, the flat brown hue lingered, as if the glow just didn’t get turned on!