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Self-Empowerment Tips & Tools |
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an e-zine for the mind, body and spirit, for men and women ISSN 1073-6158 Volume 4 Issue 1 |
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Table of Contents
1. Happiness
Empowerment:
Loving Yourself to Happiness |
2. Confidence
Booster |
3. Taking Control of Your Body: Love Your Body! |
4. Positive Mental Empowerment: Taking in the Good
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5. Healthy Relationship
Empowerment:: Creating Unconditional Love
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6.
Inner Self-Empowerment: Plugged Into Hope |
7. “I Love Me” Tip |
8. Spiritual Growth
Booster: Taming Anger with Compassion |
9. Ask
Daylle |
10.
Success Stories |
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1. HAPPINESS EMPOWERMENT
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I
begin every issue with an article about bringing more happiness
into your life. A sincere sense of ongoing joy eludes a majority
of people. I want to help change that! Please read this carefully
if you don’t want to waste another precious minute of life
without feeling contentment and joy when you wake up each day,
despite life’s snags. Don’t be one of those who wait until
they’re much older and then lament how much they missed. It’s
all YOUR choice. This issue I discuss how to keep your protective
walls porous in order to take risks that let happiness in NOW. Loving Yourself to Happiness Like many people, I watched Sex and the City and related to the Carrie Bradshaw character. She waffled between self-empowered and struggles with men. I’ve been there. She stood up for herself in many situations while her obsession with Big showed her vulnerability. The show was fiction. People watched to live vicariously through the 4 friends. As I watched the final episode, I hoped it would end with a good message. It did. After Big finally came around and it was Carrie’s choice to be with him, she said words that made me scream, “Yes! “The most exciting, challenging and significant relationship of all is the one you have with yourself. And if you find someone to love the you YOU love, well, that’s just fabulous.”
A majority of people don’t have a good relationship with themselves. We have relationships with money, romantic partners, friends, even stuff we buy. These days, some people have better relationships with their tech toys—computers, Blackberrys, iPhones, etc.—than they have with people, no less themselves. Just today a woman said she stopped dating a guy who practically lived on line. Even his sex life was “satisfied” on porn sites. We’re becoming a society of intimacy disconnect.
YOU often come in last when relationships come to mind. Yet a LOVING relationship with yourself is most important. It sets a good foundation for all other relationships. I used to be who others wanted me to be. I bought into the hype of chasing what’s touted as a must have or must be. Nobody told me that I was important. It was all about everyone else. ! Then I discovered the blessing of loving myself. The rest of my lovely life fell into place after that! I always loved watching Carrie, Samantha, Miranda and Charlotte find their way to embracing themselves. Carrie often screwed up with men. But in the end, she learned to find the key to happiness within herself. I related. Having a loving relationship with myself IS fabulous!
What does self-loving mean? Showing yourself kindness. Making an effort to do things that are comforting or enjoyable. Respecting your needs and setting boundaries with the demands of others to get them met. Taking good care of your health is loving. So is treating yourself to a splurge. The more you treat yourself in ways that make you feel good, the more loving you feel toward YOU. This isn’t about self-absorption. It’s about a conscientious effort to take care of you. That’s self-love and it brings all sorts of goodies!
How many times do you go to a mirror and say “I love you?” Are you spoutin’ zeroes? I do it easily now. Falling in love with YOU means going beyond how you look, your age and how much money you make to appreciate the person YOU ARE and the values YOU’VE chosen. Become conscious of how loving—or not—you are to YOU. Treating yourself lovingly leads to all sorts of happy repercussions! . I’ll repeat this quote: When you—male or female—have a loving relationship with yourself, and value who you are as a unique individual who’s worthy of love and happiness, it’s harder to settle for a romantic partner who isn’t right for you. That really is just fabulous because it helps you wait to meet someone who does love you for the right reasons. Since I’ve learned to love and appreciate me, blessings manifest regularly! “The most exciting, challenging and significant relationship of all is the one you have with yourself. And if you find someone to love the you YOU love, well, that’s just fabulous.”
There will be a confidence booster in each issue. Confidence is a big key to getting what you desire. Nobody is born with good self-confidence. We all have insecurities. Some people grew up in an environment that boosted their self-esteem and nurtured confidence. More didn’t. Do one small thing that scares you. Fear definitely holds us back. Taking control of it makes you, not what cares the navigator of what you do. Think of one small thing that you’d like to do but keep postponing because you don’t know how it will turn out, which feels scary. You might be afraid to ask for what you need if you don’t know how the person will respond. Take one step toward doing that you need. Do affirmations to motivate yourself to take the step forward into the unknown. Prepare yourself to make the call, and make it. Express how you feel to someone you’re angry with. Doing something you’re uncomfortable doing, even it it doesn’t work out as you’d like it, give you control that builds confidence. As you get to the other side of one thing, try another.
I’ve had clients moan about how fat they are in their size 2, 4 or 6 bodies, while I sit there saying, “excuse me but if you call yourself fat, then I must be a huge blimp in your eyes.” They always seem horrified that I’d think they see me that way, since they do see me as the beautiful, sexy woman I am! Yet they’re so hard on their view of themselves. I believe them. Many of us see ourselves in a distorted mirror that magnifies every bit of excess skin, pound, or cellulite dimple. I know how that feels since I used to have a big distorted mirror that highlighted every bit of cellulite and other imperfections. And it minimized the wonderful things about me. Fat! Fat! Fat! That’s what those mirror radiate. You might see others as they truly are but these mirrors make your see yourself in a harsh light. Each comparison to someone thinner — each person who comments negatively on our weight — each time we look in the mirror and notice a roll of cellulite in the waistline or skin hanging on the upper arms — each negative view of your body makes self-esteem goes down another notch. People feel too fat, too skinny, too pale, too dark, too frizzy-haired, too straight-haired, too bald, too flat-chested, too voluptuous, too bottom heavy, too top heavy, too—too—too! VERY few people are satisfied with how they look. The quest for perfection is strong, yet impossible. We focus on what we don’t like instead of good qualities. You all have them! Nobody begins life with good self-esteem. It develops, or not, as you grow and create your self-perception. Unfortunately, many outside factors can dampen even the brightest intentions of loving yourself as you are. I meet few people of either sex who have a truly good self-image, and a minimal amount of insecurity about something. Why do we judge ourselves so harshly?? There are some common reasons: * Fat is used generically: We call ourselves fat for the slightest imperfection. You’re bloated for a few days and feel fat. You ate a big meal and consider yourself fat. It seems like anything that doesn’t feel right with your body can elicit feelings of fat. That word has way too much power! And way too little true interpretation of the word. Most of us self-proclaimed fatties aren’t fat. We’re just no perfectly thin. But every time you refer to yourself as fat, the word stabs you. I remember how awful that felt. You may not be conscious of it if you’re used to the pangs of shame or self-hatred but they sink in subconsciously to hurt your self-image. * The media: You all know the drill. We see the airbrushed, buff celebs—men and women—in magazines, on TV and in films and strive to be like them. Many men like that standard in women and push their partner to look like the images they see. Women want the men they see in the media. It’s so unreal yet it drives us. Crazy! * Words that used to mean a sexy woman now mean fat: I’ve heard men say that if they read a personal ad and see the words curvy or voluptuous, they assume that the woman is fat. Hello! These are NICE words! Lack of appreciation for a womanly body is sending us to surgery, and eating disorders. I AM curvy and voluptuous, and proud of it! * Comparisons: There will always be someone with a better body. Yet some of us torment ourselves by thinking we won’t be happy until we’re more like him or her. So we go after their bodies and feel inadequate for never quite getting it “right.” Yet no one can be a clone of another. That person you envy for his abs or her legs might envy you for your gorgeous head of hair—which you ignore in your quest for what you don’t have! * Cultural standards making the average sized woman feel like she’s unacceptable: Size 12+ women have the majority but allow we allow ourselves to be treated like a substandard minority. Plus size women are often normal size. But being called plus-size can create shame. If you become more aware of these factors, you can try to slowly find ways to deal with them. Body image issues will always be there. It’s YOUR choice to internalize them or keep them outside of your perception. You can love and appreciate yourself as you are, or make yourself miserable chasing what you’re not. Use some of the tips from my last post to practice loving and appreciating the packaging you come it. Do what you can to improve what’s possible and make the most of what you have.
We can do many things to improve our health. Good mental health is critical for our healthy well-being. Consciousness can help you improve yours!
Much as your body is built from the foods you eat, your mind is built from the experiences you have. The flow of experience gradually sculpts your brain, thus shaping your mind. Some of the results are explicit recollections: this is what I did last summer; that is how I felt when I was in love. But most of the results remain forever unconscious. This is called implicit memory, and it includes your expectations, models of relationships, emotional tendencies, and general outlook. Implicit memory establishes the interior landscape of your mind—what it feels like to be you. In other words, you are largely what you (implicitly) remember, the slowly accumulating residues of lived experience.
In a sense, those residues can be sorted into two piles: those that benefit you and others, and those that cause harm. To paraphrase the Wise Effort section of Buddhism’s Noble Eightfold Path, it will help you to create, preserve, and increase beneficial implicit memories, and prevent, eliminate, or decrease harmful ones. The Negativity Bias of Memory Sure, negative experiences do have benefits: loss opens the heart, remorse provides a moral compass, anxiety alerts you to threats, and anger spotlights wrongs that should be righted. But do you really think you’re not having enough negative experiences?! Emotional pain with no benefit to yourself or others is pointless suffering. And pain today breeds more pain tomorrow. For instance, even a single episode of major depression can reshape circuits of the brain to make future episodes more likely. INTERNALIZING THE POSITIVE 1. Turn positive facts into positive experiences. Good things keep happening all around us, but much of the time we don’t notice them; even when we do, we hardly feel them. Someone is nice to you, you see an admirable quality in yourself, a flower is blooming, you finished a difficult project—and it all just rolls by. Instead, actively look for good news, particularly the little stuff of daily life: the faces of children, the smell of an orange, a memory from a happy vacation, a minor success at work, and so on. Whatever positive facts you find, bring a mindful awareness to them—open up to them and let them affect you. It’s like sitting down to a banquet: don’t just look at it—dig in! 2. Savor the experience. It’s delicious! Make it last by staying with it for 5, 10, even 20 seconds; don’t let your attention skitter off to something else. Focus on your emotions and body sensations, since these are the essence of implicit memory. Let the experience fill your body and be as intense as possible. For example, if someone is good to you, let the feeling of being cared about bring warmth to your whole chest. .
Pay particular attention to the rewarding aspects of the experience—for example, how good it feels to get a great big hug from someone you love. Focusing on these rewards increases dopamine release, which makes it easier to keep giving the experience your attention, and strengthens its neural associations in implicit memory. You’re not doing this to cling to the rewards—which would make you suffer—but rather to internalize them so that you carry them inside you and don’t need to reach for them in the outer world. The longer that something is held in awareness and the more emotionally stimulating it is, the more neurons that fire and thus wire together, and the stronger the trace in memory (Lewis 2005). While you’re savoring an experience, your amygdala is busily highlighting its positive emotional meaning for your hippocampus, which integrates that information into its packaging of the experience for storage in long-term memory. You can also intensify an experience by deliberately enriching it. For example, if you are savoring a relationship experience, you could call up other feelings of being loved by others, which will help stimulate oxytocin—the “bonding hormone”—and deepen your sense of relatedness. Or you could strengthen your feelings of satisfaction after completing a demanding project by thinking about some of the challenges you had to overcome. 3. Imagine or feel the experience is sinking deeply into your mind and body, like warm sun into a T-shirt, water into a sponge, or a jewel placed in a treasure chest in your heart. Keep relaxing your body and absorbing the emotions, sensations, and thoughts of the experience. Rick Hanson, Ph.D., is a neuropsychologist and meditation teacher. A summa cum laude graduate of the University of California, Los Angeles, he cofounded the Wellspring Institute for Neuroscience and Contemplative Wisdom and edits the Wise Brain Bulletin.
Creating Unconditional Love Love, commitment and relationships seem to be in disfavor these days. I’m seeing a lot of articles and TV shows saying love doesn‚t last, so why bother. But, I believe that all of us want to be loved, and I know from experience that a relationship can work, and that a great partnership is a joy not to be missed. A lot of people come into my office searching for love, especially unconditional love. I tell them, be careful what you want‚. Unconditional love can be interpreted to mean, "You can be abusive to me, you can cheat on me, and I still have to love you." If you want really unconditional love, you might want to invest in a puppy or give your mom a call. But, if unconditional love is interpreted as "uncritical love" or "accepting love" it is attainable. What we really long for is the security of knowing that we'll be loved in spite of our shortcomings and mistakes. When a couple builds a successful working partnership in which each person feels supported and respected by the other and each feels that the other has his or her best interests at heart; problems are solved not "my way" or "your way" but so that both are happy with the solution. Mutual partnership creates a loving environment where deep trust can grow. When rust, respect, responsibility and love feel mutual, that's when we feel secure in love. Almost everyone has an "ideal relationship" in mind, which includes both realistic and unrealistic fantasies. Often this ideal is unconscious, and can result in a sense of loss, hopelessness or anger at times when your actual situation falls far short of your ideal. You can hope, for example, that your partner will be delighted with all that you are, flaws included, and would make absolutely no demands on you. If these hopes go unexamined and untempered by the realization that they are unrealistic, and your partner does inevitably get annoyed or upset, you might overreact with hurt, anger, or despair, when simple recognition and discussion of the problem is all that's needed. You can reduce the negative impact of expectations by sharing your hopes and dreams with your partner, and working together to set goals and to realize more of your dreams. For example, if you understand an intimate partner will get irritated with you from time to time (and vice versa), you can be open about what is irritating, negotiate ways to minimize the frustration and friction by building in more space to be yourselves, and also work to improve yourself where you see fit, which will reduce the number of times your partner is annoyed, and make your real relationship seem more like your ideal of receiving unconditional love and approval. Most people have some unrealistic expectations about love and partnership—either they expect things to be easier than they turn out to be, or more difficult. Our yearning for an unrealistically ideal relationship begins with longing to find someone who will satisfy the unfulfilled cravings for attention, approval, companionship, support and love that may have been left unsatisfied since we were children. We formulate our hopes and fears about relationships from these initial feelings. New love, in its stew of lust, adrenaline, excitement, exaltation, love, admiration, hope, harmony, laughter, suspense, despair, sensual pleasure, and joy seems automatically and effortlessly to fulfill all our expectations. But as soon as the first rush is over, reality sets in and the work begins. When couples begin believing that they'll live Happily Ever After in an effortless state of bliss, this natural subsiding of infatuation and confrontation with the reality of each other often seems to confirm their fears that love won't work, and lead to disappointment, pain and dissatisfaction. A relationship model based on realistic analysis of who you are, what you want and what your circumstances are can be every bit as exciting and satisfying (more so, because you can actually accomplish it) as your most romantic fantasy. What is realistic will vary from couple to couple, will change with varying circumstances, and will also depend to some degree on what each of you wants in your relationship. You can have happiness, satisfaction, excitement, and fulfillment, even though life and relationships aren't effortless and perfect. Everyone has different needs for closeness and space, for communication and silence, for accomplishment and relaxation. Being honest about what works (even when it's different than the accepted role models) means taking the risk that both partners will not want the same things. Equal partners take responsibility for revealing who they really are, asking directly for what they want and being honest about preferences. Thus, both partners take the risk of hearing "no", and getting disappointed. These personal risks are the most challenging kind, because both partners expose the most private aspects of their personalities, and both risk being rejected. The reward for taking this risk is a sustainable relationship that feels natural to both partners because it suits the needs and talents of both, and makes only reasonable demands on each. It will remain pleasant, satisfying and functional for a lifetime. Your expectations about relationships can be either helpful, if they provide reasonable and effective goals to strive for; or harmful, if they are so unrealistic that you cannot ever attain them, and they become a source of ongoing disappointment and a sense of failure. A useful ideal allows for the realities and limitations of life without manufacturing needless barriers to growth and change, and provides an atmosphere that supports both of you to be the best you can be as autonomous, equal partners. Here are 5 tips, for creating the real - life version of unconditional love. 1. Talk about your mutual expectations. If you discuss your hopes and dreams about marriage, sex, money, sharing a home, and the future in advance, you'll get a chance to see how well you work things out together. If you just struggle and get nowhere, you'll need some help to make your relationship work. 2. Remember that goodwill counts. Don't forget to say the nice things, complements, thank you's—and request that your partner learn to do that, too. It's as if you have a "relationship reservoir", which stores up all the good feelings and memories—when times get tough, you draw on that. If it has lots of negatives, resentments, etc, your marriage will not have staying power. If your reservoir is full of goodwill and love, your marriage will survive the tough times. 3. Get relationship counseling. A good counselor or minister will be able to ask the questions that you may not have thought of, or may be avoiding. Because the counselor is not involved, his or her objective viewpoint can help you open up your communication. You can improve your already good relationship to the point where it‚s completely satisfying. 4. Sex is important. A satisfying sexual life will do more to cement the security of your relationship than anything else. Don't downgrade the importance of sex, be sure your communication about sexual issues is open, and be prepared to learn long - term sexual skills, which are different from pre - marital or newlywed sex. Sex in a committed relationship serves a lot of functions. It’s a great way to comfort each other, to reassure each other, and to heal emotional rifts, and it can be good for the life of your marriage. 5. Have a regular "state of the union" meeting, on at least a weekly basis, where you get together, without interruptions (turn off the computer, phone and TV) to talk about how well your relationship is working, whether you're feeling good about it, and to bring up any problems that need discussing. You'll find, if you do this regularly, your problems will never become major, and will always be easy to handle.
Plugged Into Hope
There are some things in life that are very cut and dried: “Look both ways before you cross the street.” “Say ‘please’ and ‘thank-you’.” “Don’t run with scissors.” “DVR all Bravo TV’s reality shows.” Other aspects of life, especially those that have a philosophical bent, are not so clear-cut. In fact, we're really on our own to determine the answers to many of life’s bigger questions. What does it all mean? What happens when we die? Is there a God? Does that guy I like even know I’m alive? (OK -- that last one is fairly obvious). I’m not about to take on these queries grande here, but I would like to address a topic that is not so much a question as a big bowl of confusion: The meaning of Hope (capitalized by me lovingly for emphasis). What is Hope? The meaning of Hope has long been open to interpretation and this is where the confusion starts. Is Hope a wish? A promise? An empty promise? A longing? A pining? A dreaming? A desire? An expectation? A sucker's bet? The center of a chump sandwich? A feeling? A guarantee? A virtue? Optimism? The opposite of pessimism? You see, Hope seems as if it's subjective. People almost regard it as if it were something personal like their toothbrush -- like “my Hope is not your Hope. Your Hope is gross and doesn’t work as well as mine.” Yet Hope is not in the mind of the Hoper as in the aphorism "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder." Even though this is how Hope is commonly viewed, individualistic, like the aforementioned toothbrush. In fact, I'm a little surprised we don't already go around saying, "You know what they say Fella, 'hope is in the mind of the hoper,'" as we whittle away while making our corncob pipes. Once we are plugged into pure Hope, we are then truly empowered. This is how Hope really works for us. Not only are we happier, we are freer. Why? Because then there is no person, circumstance, or event that will cause us to loose Hope. Hope will not depart. Yes, it is natural for Hope to dim a little during difficult times, but it will stick with us through thick and thin. Not only will it see us through challenges, we will be more at peace, more forgiving, and more productive, because we won’t be hanging on to our old baggage. We will also be lighter and more loving toward everyone. At this level, Hope has the power to heal us. As we heal ourselves with Hope, we help to heal the world, one plugged-into-Hope heart at a time. Alix Flood is a writer and filmmaker. A former staff-writer for MTV.com, she wrote and directed the feature-length comedy “A Totally Minor Motion Picture.” Currently she is writing her blog, “A Flood of Hope (& Humor)” as well as a book about her personal spiritual philosophies and experiences.
I used to be an angry girl. Whenever someone did me wrong—grrrrrrrr! I complained to anyone who’d listen about what people had done to me. The anger kept me fuming instead of smiling. I saw some people in my life as bad, which in turn, attracted more people to complain about. Then I read a book by the Dalai Lama. It blew me away because his philosophy about compassion made so much sense. When I read the book I was feeling anger and frustration toward Mike (not his real name!), a guy I’d been dating. We were friends for months before we crossed the line to more than friends. He couldn’t do enough for me. But when he got the flu, with high fever, and I offered to bring him some food (he literally had NONE in his apartment), he fervently refused to let me. I argued that I wanted to help him out. He got angry. And angrier, and then accused me of being a typical nagging woman. All because I tried to convince him to let me drop off something for him to eat so he could recover and not take Vitamin C on an empty stomach! He yelled more and more as I reminded him how he insisted on bringing me food and keeping me company after I had oral surgery the week before. Now I wanted to support him. I even offered to leave the food outside his door if he didn’t want to see me. The more I tried to convince him, the more he accused me of fooling him into thinking I was different than many women. In his eyes I was now a nag. It was so irrational. We talked a few days later. At first it was fine, but when I commented that it was a shame he misread my desire to help him, he went off on me again. More irrational accusations about how terrible I was for trying to help him. Yelling. Anger. I knew that Mike’s background included an abusive mother, two bitter divorces and cutting himself off from his whole family. He’d been badly burned by his last girlfriend. I it was his issues ranting. But calling me a nag for being concerned about the health of someone I cared about still seemed ridiculous! I was furious at being judging me so harshly. I wasn’t nagging, and tried hard to make him understand that. But he didn’t budge. Reading about the Dalai Lama’s philosophy of compassion opened me to a higher level of handling people who push my buttons. He emphasizes seeking peacefulness through compassion to those who hurt you by understanding that people who hurt others are suffering more. They do awful things because of pain they've experienced. And they hurt themselves each time they hurt others. Wow! I already figured that Mike was being so illogical because he was scared of being hurt again. In his effort to do what seemed like self-protection, he hurt me. Past experiences gave him a bad attitude about women so when I pushed to help him, it felt like the nagging he’d experienced from women who’d hurt him. He’d never learned to receive. The Dalai Lama’s words made me call Mike. I accepted that he’d never see my way and wanted to get closure peacefully, with the compassion I’d just learned about. Mike seemed happy to hear from me. Maybe he thought we could just ignore his outbursts and move on. But I knew he’d always be a time bomb, waiting to go off if I tried to return his caring. After chatting a bit, I again said I felt bad that he attributed nasty motives to my offer, since there were none. He immediately began to rage. This time I didn’t defend myself or try to convince him. I just gently repeated over and over, “I know that you’re hurting and can’t help responding like this. I have compassion for your pain.” Mike didn’t touch that statement. He calmed down a little. I explained that I felt very sorry that he had so much pain from others and needed to inflict it on me. Like a roller coaster he went up and down with other accusations and mean spirited comments, then calmed as I repeated my words, softly. I rode along with my seat belt fastened. He seemed to get spurts of rage about my remaining calm. Mike tried to create drama and I wouldn’t let him. Yet he never—not once—attacked or challenged my compassionate words. For the first time I was in complete control of anger! He blustered as I felt incredibly peaceful, with no anger left. Having compassion made me feel calm. The more he went on irrationally, the more compassion I felt. I barely said anything else but those words. When we hung up, I knew that was it for us. Compassion had taught me acceptance of a sad situation—for how Mike kept hurting himself. I was the best person in his life and he lost me. The next day, I emailed to wish him good luck and expressed my compassion in writing. I felt good, instead of the usual rnegative residuals from anger. Since then, remembering the Dalai Lama’s concept of compassion has helped me to minimize my anger in most situations. Who provoked you recently? Are they happy? Happy people don’t need to hurt others. Insecure ones criticize and take advantage. People with a positive self-image are less likely to consciously do that. Insecure folks have been bashed themselves. Loving yourself makes it easier to be kind to unhappy souls. In situations that rile me, I now realize that what people do or say stems from their own unhappiness. Instead of anger, I feel sorry for them. Choose to let compassion temper anger. Why allow someone’s dysfunction to debilitate you with complaints and rage? People who are nasty and mean don’t love themselves. Their pain motivates them to hurt others. When you understand that they’re are hurting themselves more, you can feel sorry for them instead of getting hurt. This philosophy has nurtured my inner peace. I highly recommend it! My compassion is on an individual basis. I still lose it sometimes. There are people who push my buttons too far and create short-term anger. But, then I look for their source of pain so compassion can take over. It makes sense. Compassion takes nothing from me and anger does no good. That doesn’t mean letting people get away with unfair behavior. I take appropriate action if I'm wronged. But my strong desire to take good care of myself motivates me to replace anger with compassion. I express myself in a nice but firm way and take appropriate action to rectify the situation. You CAN choose not to absorb someone's negativity. Practice. It sure feels good! Don’t give others power to affect you so much! This doesn’t mean you push anger aside because you feel sorry for the person. You can’t swallow anger without getting life indigestion. Have compassion but still express feelings. Get it out gently but get it out. Otherwise, anger multiplies at your expense. I feel so blessed with my life, my positive attitude, and my total faith in God, that I’m generous. But I’ll end negative friendships and do what’s necessary to move on when I must. Be true to your values. Yes, there are unkind or downright evil people. But those who do the dirty on others aren’t happy. Mean people NEVER have enough money; NEVER have enough power; NEVER feel satisfied. To me THAT is punishment. People may feel perverse pleasure by hurting others; they may be honored for something or become rich and famous. But I truly believe they can't be happy inside. They step on others to get more of what they're never satisfied with. I feel blessed with all I have and grateful as heck to be doing what I love. I love being in a good mood most of the time. When you practice letting angry situations roll off you by showing compassion, you’ll understand why it’s such a blessing! Being generous about giving compassion to others is a gift—to YOU.
In each issue I’ll answer a question about how to handle a specific situation. Please send in questions about something that you’d like help with. Standing up to my neighbor My answer:
It begins with accepting that you’re in the right. You know you’re right but people’s responses can make you question that. Once you’re confident about your right to your parking spot—tell—don’t ask her not to park in yours again. Asking offers a choice. Telling doesn’t. Say it nicely but with a firm tone that says you mean it. “You can’t take my spot anymore. I’d rather settle this nicely between us but I’ll go further if I have to. You can park in the empty spaces you direct me to.” Keep a mile on your face the whole time and be amicable. To ease her into it you can begin by telling her that you value her as a neighbor and don’t want this to hurt your good relationship. If she gets stupid and ignores you, ask for help from the building manager.
I let go! I'm turning people down! Well, that’s all for this issue. If you like my articles, please subcribe to my blog, Lessons from a Recovering DoorMat. A BIG thank you to Tina Tessina, Rick Hanson and Alix Flood for allowing me to include their input. Please write and tell me things you’d like me to write about.
With love from, Daylle http://www.daylle.com
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© 2010 Project Self-Empowerment, LLC |