Enough

 

 

In my own life I know that my state of cheerfulness is a reliable gauge of my level of spiritual enlightenment at that moment. The more cheerful, happy, contented, and satisfied I am feeling, the more aware I am of my deep connection to Spirit. -Wayne Dyer

Satisfaction in your life does not include happiness.  Satisfaction is speaking of emotional aspects.  Happiness has to do with attitude, I think.  Satisfaction is discovered through comparing what we have to what others have.  It is also a lifetime of checks and balances.  We tend to weigh the negatives and the positives.  The negatives and positives we find depend on our perspective.  If we choose to focus on negatives, we will see the balance as negative.  If we are a happier person, we will tend to see our life experiences as positive. 

Now, living a quarter century, I realize that I have become more satisfied with my life.  There is less drama, less stumbling blocks, less detours having to be made.  Perhaps iit is because I do less in the outside world and more within the environment I have created, that I call “home”.  I have learned to accept my path, knowing that block may come, but am sure of myself enough to know I have figured out how to deal with them.  Some of that is planning and practicing skills that help me do so.  (I can say, the main anxiety I have is the death of a spouse.  I still wish to go first because I do not want to go through that ever again.  I have been working, in the background, on not allowing myself to bond too deeply (sad state of affairs, that) and am making sure I have a plan A,B, and C.  I can logically see that my life is better now than ever before.  I expect wonderful experiences and surprises as it tends to be that people are circling back into my life and I do things that keep me lifelong learning and I have more time to do things that brighten up my world and days.  I do not have time to scroll through all the things I wish I had done differently and have accepted a belief that things happen in our lives for a reason and I am who I am today through lessons learned.  I am no longer afraid of good things happening with the expectation that it will balance itself out with not good things.  I face each new day knowing I have coping skills and I have learned how to go with the unexpected.  When negative things happen, I tend to work out the problem faster than before.  I enjoy the smaller things of life more now.  I definitely know that mental health affects and colors everything we do, think, experience, and resilience comes from learning how to not slip into emotionalism (disaster-thinking) and giving my ego / lizard brain /Evil Inner Witch rein.  I stay more present.  I am learning to build on important connections, nurturing and caring more for those I love and that I love, being open for new connections.  I seldom allow anxiety, and if I do, I get right to the key trigger of such so that I can acknowledge and let it go.  I have never been a sad person, typically, unless I do have something of grief to enter my life.  I honor those things and let my soul take its time to deal with them without sinking into a puddle of muddle.   So I always do it right?  Of course not.  I still have many things to work on; defensiveness for one.  Fear is another thing I have worked on because I do, now, know, that I have been a fear-driven person.

I have to stop sometimes and remind myself of how good I have it.  Yes, I have physical things that hurt, that cause me to really watch what I eat, and watch what I want, need, desire, so that I am not trying to pacify myself for some reason. 

I am a generally happy person and part of why I am happy is because I have learned to be satisfied with life.  I am very aware that I, truly, am ENOUGH.  I have enough.  I have always been authentically enough.  I will always be enough, because I have learned to be myself, be present, and be satisfied.

Are you satisfied with your life?  What makes you feel satisfied or dissatisfied?  Do you get that Satisfaction is a state of mind?  To me, you are all enough.  Enough said!

©Carol Desjarlais 7.28.22

 

 

Throwing Shade

 

 

“To ‘throw shade’ means to belittle, dismiss, show disgust, disapproval, disbelief, insult, degrade, or negatively condemn verbally or non-verbally (with bodily gestures).” - All Things How

Having shade thrown at you, in any way, hurts andf is a pain that equals physical pain, depending on the amount of shade and what place you are at when it is done.  The body, mind, heart and soul do not determine what is hurt, but it hurts.  But, it is part of life to have it happen.  A human fear is rejection and that began when tribes began.  Being accepted made the difference between life or death and the hurt, we feel even today, is a primal reaction.

When someone “throws shade, it undermines our self-worth because we are conditioned to being critiqued, being spurned, being disciplkined, and/or being rejected.    We are not logical when it happens.  We tend to immediately feel “not good enough”, like a reprimanded child.  We, most often, turn on ourselves as if our worth depends on the critque of others.  It can cause us to reject ourselves, to becoming anxious, depressed, and feeling rejected.   We should learn to counter and diffuse the negativity no matter how it comes or how light the shade.

Somehow, we have to become more resilient.  Nom, we are not always right and we do deserve some shade now and again.  Yes, we do need some correcting some kind at times.  But, it should come from someone who truly cares about us and our happiness.  There will always be someone who does not like you.  Most people like me, but there are a few I can name who totally do not and usually they have a reason for that that is valid. 

I used to counsel the youth I worked with that there will be times that somone might call you a “beotch”, for instance.  In order not to give up your power and sink into poor self-esteem over it, or get angry and retaliate, I tell them to just smile.  I said to take a few moments and consider if you have been what they called you.  I can tell you the times I have been a total beotch. So, knowing that, when they call me a beotch, I can smile and internally agree.  That takes away all their power and gives you immense power.  You control what happens, they do not.  It takes all the wind out of their sails. 

Why do we choose to believe what others say or think of us?  Why do we allow ourselves to feel repulsion at ourselves when we are seen making a mistke and are criticized for it by someone who has nothing to do with us other than that they, most likely, often throw shade?  Why do we, immediately, allow them to make us feel angry?  Why is it so hard to agree to diagree?  Why do we sink to their levrl with smart mouth replies full of sarcasm?  Why do we not, immedaitely remember that hurt people hurt people”?  Why?  Because we are conditioned to need to be liked, accepted, kept in a tribe, and our Lizard Brain still thinks it means death to not belong.

We have to remember how good we are at recovering and regain our steps forward in our progression.  We are exactly who and what we should be, at this present moment, and shade or no shade.  There is no logic in allowing someone else define us.    Refuse, absolutely, to be drawn into someone else’s drama and need for drama.  Throwing shade is a purely selfish act for them to feel better than us.  Other’s judgements are acceptable when we ask for them.  Being judged is for sompetitions, not everyday life.  Everyone hads their own set of optinions and good on them, we do not have to agree, but neither do we need to demand that  they accept ours.  Simply know in your own hert what you value what you believe, and why.  But, be open to learning something new.  If I was as quick about a smrt reply as I wish I had been many times, I would be in a world of hurt.  I have had to learn that I do not think too quickly, of a retort, is because something/someone protects me from sinking to a bully’s level. I can think of the smartest things, after the fact and usually it is defensive and not very nice because I tend to throw in a swear word or two. 

I refuse to be around people who somehow think they are, in some way, more superior than I so that they feel a need to rain on my parade.  No one has that right.  No one knows what is in your heart.  No one knows your whole story.  And we need darn good boundaries in order to repel the shade when it comes, and it will come.  Consider the source. 

 The only people that really matter in life are the people that can “see” your heart and rejoice with you.” ― Shannon L. Alder

©Carol Desjarlais 7.27.22

 

Abuntu: Hygge

 

 

The quest for happiness and peace is global, universal, and sits in the soul and desires so that we continue to have that longing.  Abuntu,an African term, means universal happiness.  Hygge, a Norweigian / Swedish word, speaks to fostering of deep connections with others, the environment and the present moment, and is similar in terms to abuntu.  Both speak to connectedness for the purpose of reaching happiness.  The comfort of connections is huge.    We need positive connections in ordr to be comforted, to mitigate stress and emotonal woundedness.  Shared experience deepen the positive aspects through connected healing.  From the beginning, we developed our tribe, and we would sacrifice much for the happiness and comfort and calm and peace of our tribe.

I love the fact that the African Bantu would bring a wrong-doer to the center of the village and everyone spoke of something good about that person in order to regain unity and harmony through compassion.  How far away have we come from that.

If you have abuntu in your life, it means that your tribe has a natural leader that is independent, ambitious, courageous, and is willing to take risks through advenruring into unknown territories.  Those of us who have adbuntu in our lives are what leaders are made of;  our energy levels are high, we resist cultural, societal, and personal barriers placed before us that might keep us from peace and serenity.  We seek weays to better ourselves so that we might send out vibes that we desire grace and admiration but not without need, but with confidence that we have gifts to share with the world in some small way, or some lage way, so peace might be obtained for all.

If we have hygge in our lives, we are content with who we are and what we are and the contenment is passed on to others through comfort and open caring for others of our tribe, of our country, of our world. 

Robert Shaplen, a writer for the New Yorker, reported that hygge was “ubiquitous” in the city: “The sidewalks are filled with smiling, hyggelige people, who keep lifting their hats to each other and who look at a stranger with an expression that indicates they wish they knew him well enough to lift their hats to him, too.” A hyggelige person wishes for only the basic needs in the comfort of shelter, sustenance, and a tribe of like-thinkers and doers. 

To heal the world and ourselves comes through by us all being encoruging and open-minded enough to allow others their opinions, without ire or judgement.  We need to be able to accept some things the way they are, to accept ourselves as we are, but with a mind that knows we are evolving every moment we breath. 

We need to show great compassion for people, palces and things as they too struggle to find their way to peace and happiness.  We need to reconnect with nature ( my way is finding gems and digging with my hands in the aromatic gid earth.  I hnor her in the way I honor the crystlas and jasper and agate and other gems that I find.  It is a huge responsibility to lighten up our environment, to make it pretty and inviting, and to spend time in it, for it shows us how to live with peace and scrifices  that keep others feeling pece and seneity when in yur environment.  It needs to be inviting, as well.  All of us need our own personal acred space within our envirnment;  a place that gives us space to soul-search, to ecscape within to restore ourelves.  We need to cultivate happiness and peace around us that affects others close to our ether so that, they, too, might feel peace and senity in that space when they are invited in.

In my garden, which is only about 9x9, I have found ways to light up the darknes.  My flowers are my chilren, the light stirs the night away in the predawn hours when I am typically awake and sitting outside t meditate, to pant, to spend time just BEING at one with the solace of a different kind of rest. 

Let us all seek that place and space to refill our every sense in order to feel happiness and peace and to buid up ur aura that is both comfort and compassion for others and other places and spaces and things.  Where is your refueling space? 

©Carol Desjarlais 7.26.22