Law of Attraction #6 - Knowing Yourself

I've been shooting some videos this week.  Four of them so far.  Here are the links:

Video #1
Video #2
Video #3
Video #4

The videos are due to two different inspirations.  First, Gary Jackman, a friend who went through the same coaching training program as I did, has been doing a 99 videos in 99 days challenge and I decided to give it a try to support him.  At the same time, I recently watched Netflix's Grace and Frankie, starring Lily Tomlin and Jane Fonda.  In a few of the episodes, Frankie (Tomlin) clips her iPhone down and videos herself talking about whatever is going on at the moment.  By the end of the first season, Grace (Fonda) has taken a turn herself and had what I would call, a very nice epiphany about who she is and what she wants out of life.

As I explain in video #3, I have been active in self development since roughly 2000.  For my own benefit.  Long story short, I didn't like my life.  I decided to change it.  As a result I am now in this very interesting place.  First, of course I am interested in sharing the things I have learned with other people.  Second, it has delivered me to a place where I am learning who I am.

You know that lifetime you've spent making note of everything from brussels sprouts to mean people that you don't like?  I'm not looking for my "no's" anymore.  From the moment we first get hurt in life, we seem to want to create a list of things we'd rather avoid.

Did you know that, emotionally, excitement and fear stand right next to each other and it can be indiscernible which one you are actually experiencing?  At the bottom of the pit of the life I wanted to change, I lost driving into San Francisco and many amusement park rides because I was avoiding that uncertain, unsettling feeling by just saying "no."  I've already said no.  A lot.  I'm interested in all of my "yes's."  I'm actually creating a list of things I consider to be quintessential Angela.

Of course, I do have one no in the bunch.  It turns out, after a lifetime of not having lobster because I wanted to spare whoever was paying for my dinner that price, I'm not a big fan.  When I finally had it because I was paying myself, I would have preferred the lamb I normally would have ordered.

At the same time, it gave me a small epiphany.  I live for the small epiphanies. It is from the small epiphanies that I have become the changed version of Angela I enjoy today.

Essentially there is an imaginary list of myriad things we can enjoy if we are rich and powerful.  We assume if we had those things, we would be happy.  You know why money doesn't buy happiness?  Because so many of us don't really know who we are or what we really want.  Instead we have a grievance list of all the things that taste bad and the things or people we've encountered who suck.

One of the things I've learned along the way is if you simply focus on what makes you happy, you feel happier.  If you focus on the good, feeling good is like shooting fish in a barrel.  It is a done deal.

In addition to our list, we tend to have a bias not to change. At some point along the way, we hurt ourselves and we blamed change.  "Why does everything have to change?"  We moan.  "Why can't everything stay the same?"  We seem to feel that way even when everything isn't so great just because we are afraid of things becoming even worse.  We live our lives boxed in by our fears.

Which is not to say I never feel afraid anymore.  Of course I do.  I am an adult, now orphaned, unmarried only child who never had any children of her own.  I am the quintessential "the cheese stands alone."  If I let my fears run loose, my mind could come up with a lot of sad horror stories out of that.  But, if I did that, I would be sad and afraid not happy like I am now.  After all, I've been an only child my entire life.  It is only as an adult when I began to consider what I should be doing or who should be in my life that I felt any fear about being alone.  Every one of those should(s) practically leapt off that list of things I don't want.  Every one of those should(s) was considered to protect me.  Between my parents over protecting me and me over protecting me, it's a wonder I've ever had a chance to live at all.

I want to live.  I want to throw my arms around life and bury my face in her fur.  You can't do that if the thought of it makes you timid and afraid you might not like it.  From what I've learned, better to shrug off life's icky parts and devote your attention to savoring life's wonderful pleasures instead.  Leave those dishes dirty in the sink and spend an extra ten minutes watching that sunset.  Sure the dishes will still be there.  Sure they might begin to stink.  And sure that time spent watching a beautiful sunset will simply be wasted if all you do while you finally wash those dishes is complain and say you SHOULD have washed them earlier.  So don't do that.  Instead, remind yourself with each and every dish just how beautiful that moment was.  Don't regret your joyful moments simply because of a nuisance of inconvenience.

And stop looking to be offended by everything all the time.  Looking to be happy = happy.  Looking to be offended = offended.

You've heard the saying, of course, "It is always in the last place you look?"  Have you ever thought, "Of course it is because you STOP looking!"  Life is exactly the same way.  What you look for, you will see.  Every time.  Isn't it time you start building yourself a better world?

Law of Attraction #5 - Letting Go

Today is my day off and I am spending it in the company of Peabody and Sherman for the first time in awhile.  To me, it is like they are constantly fussing with each other.  Play fighting.  Or fight playing.  As I sit here at the computer, I can hear them rolling about until eventually someone growls or hisses.  And I intervene.  Just a moment ago I segregated them.  Had a heart to heart with Peabody and heard myself saying:

"Is this how the two of you behave while I'm at work?"

Hey wait a minute.

I opened the door to the bedroom.  Sure enough Sherman was waiting on the other side looking quizzical as to why he had been shut out in the first place.  Even if I could tell him, in a way he could understand, "I was separating you to protect you."  If he didn't give me the "what is wrong with girls' look, he would give me the "poor silly humans" look.  (At least in my imagination.)  Because the truth is, he and Peabody are friends.  They probably play like that EVERY day.  It is probably the reason I find them both passed out asleep on my bed when I come home.  

It is interesting having a three-legged cat.  It is changing my perceptions. 

Fairly early on, my house fell into a flea problem.  It is an enormous story.  Full of Law of Attraction moments and significance, but to get to where we need to be, I will need to fast forward.  I have acquired medicine and put it on his neck.  My awkwardness and newness at holding him in my arms has positioned it a little too far back on his shoulder blades and he is fussing with it.  He is in constant motion.  Kicking, scratching and biting at fleas.  Worse than before the medicine went on.  Amazingly, I can see fleas dropping off him.  I have never seen that before with the other cats.  He arches his head around and successfully licks the poisonous spot!  Immediately the wetness at the surface of his mouth becomes foamy.

Shit!

I wet a towel and blot at his mouth.  Then I clean off the poison spot with the wet towel and wait and watch.  He seems better.  Still itchy, but in less distress.  I think of the fleas dropping off him.  I remember I have seen that before.  Years ago when I had my cat Bocce who was the only cat I bathed regularly.  He was also the only cat who, when I bathed him, had brown water run off him.  Brown water and occasionally fleas.  I can't find my flea comb to selectively drown them, but if I give Sherman a bath, that will drown them.  

I fill the bathtub with about an inch or two of lukewarm water and gently set Sherman down into it.  He is calm and allows me, not only to stand him in there, but to gently massage water into his dry fur.    He is shockingly calm in the water.  He is much less so during the drying.  Eventually I find myself cornering him in my bathroom with a towel.  It is an action I would take with any of my cats without thinking, but brusquely rubbing his fur to dry it, I realize I have assumed he knows I am trying to help him and not hurt him.  I have seen things so completely from my own point of view, I have been in danger of forgetting that I am working with a kitty who has had some stuff happen to him.  Trust needs to be built.  I dry him off as thoroughly and diplomatically as I can.  When it is safe to "flea him" again, I give him a slightly lighter dose than his body weight and leave for the day.  I stop micromanaging him and he is thriving.  I can witness the trust building.  

Our inner viewpoint has no peripheral vision.  Once in awhile it can include the misty vantage point of truths we know because we "used to be" that way, but otherwise we are locked into our viewpoint and our viewpoint only.  That is precisely part of why letting go in life is so essential.  Our viewpoint is a narrow column and there are all sorts of wonderful things that lay just to the right or left of it.  When we resist and try to force everything into our narrow round column of vision, it is like those wonderful possibilities get chopped off shoving a rectangle into that circle.  We narrow our field of possible outcomes.  

Law of Attraction #4 - Being Seen and Appreciated for Who I Am

This year I have received two of the best compliments I have ever received in my life.  Actually the first of the two and the one I want to talk about today, began in 2014 and came to its final fruition this July.

This is the reason for doing all of the work.  The things you want most in life are visiting you daily, but until you flip your switch and see the world through that porthole, you will never see, know or appreciate that.  Let me explain.

Last year a friend of mine asked me to photograph her wedding.  I am not a wedding photographer.  Honestly, if you asked me today what I am, I would be hard pressed to say.  It once was modesty or a lack of self esteem, but today it feels like you are just dealing with a person who has never quite thought "in the box."  Or really, as an old friend used to call me, I supposed you are just dealing with a "spoiled brat."  I studied and am trained in photography.  When it came to choose a money making field within photography, I could never make peace with enslaving something I love to someone else's vision.  In other words, I wanted to shoot what I wanted to shoot not what you wanted me to shoot.  I know that was limited in scope, vision and belief, but at the time I could not see a way around it.  Gently, I reminded my friend what my photography was like.  I said aloud, "I am not a Wedding Photographer."

I don't remember how she convinced me.

I do know it became apparent that, while I was avoiding putting myself at risk .... (Which is essentially what I was doing, swimming like a very large fish in my pond built for one.)  ..... apparently at least one person was watching because it became clear she knew a bit about my artistic sensibilities and really did want me to be her wedding photographer.  So I agreed.

Of course it is one thing to say you will do a thing and quite another to actually do it.  When I agreed, the wedding was nearly a year away.  I did take a Saturday or Sunday and shoot something called the "Save the Date" photo.  That photo is at this link:

Save The Date

The year passed.  I lived my life and gave very little thought to the wedding.  I went on not one, but two unique "bucket list" style vacations.  Mardi Gras in New Orleans and an Alaskan Cruise.  The latter fell just two weeks before.  It was arguably the best trip I had ever been on.  The "at sea" days contained Abraham-Hicks workshops; the port days contained fantastic excursions.  In between there were amazing views and staff always looking out for you, squirting Purell into your palm and asking if you would like anything to drink.

Right before I left on the cruise, the bride sent me an email with a list detailing the formal shots she would like me to take.  My eyes swept over it and my brain said, "I'll think about this when I get home."  In that moment, I began building a platform of "I don't know what I'm doing" inside me and when I finally took a good look at it, a week before the wedding, my self confidence fell like it had been hurled out of a 747.  For a couple who had said they weren't really into the formal shots, there were a lot of them.  Or at least it looked like there was to my ever widening, frightened eyes.  I spent nearly the entire week leading up to the wedding seeing it as this terrible, uncomfortable thing I had somehow tricked myself into believing I could do.

At the same time, I have always been a fighter, so I began strategizing and planning how to make it happen.  The fear strangling my mind in its frozen grasp began thawing and my creativity began blossoming.  I enlisted two friends to help and be my "photographer's assistants."  Since they are both photographers themselves, I gave them official duties.  One was in charge of setting up and maintaining two GoPro cameras I wanted running during the wedding and the reception.  While it wouldn't give them what I considered the typical wedding video and I hadn't volunteered to shoot any video in the first place, I thought it would give the couple unique and contemporary footage of the event.  I had also seen a wedding video online where people attached a GoPro camera to a whiskey bottle and then passed it around the reception, asking guests to give the couple a unique toast.  I thought perhaps I could get something fun and interesting if I simply passed the word among the guests that I had two GoPro's running and they were invited to stand in front of one at any time during the reception and voice their best wishes for the bride and groom.

The last item on the bride's list had been the couple's desire to have a photo of each of their guests, so I put my other assistant in charge of creating "faux selfies.".  Once again I hoped it would be fun and contemporary and I could combine them with the more traditional portraits that I would shoot.

I was beginning to feel more optimistic and excited about shooting the wedding, but it was when I began picturing how I would present the photos to the couple that the real shift or "pivot" as Abraham-Hicks would call it, happened.  Back when I had been a bride a million years ago and "Save the Date" photos were called an "Engagement Photo," wedding photographers used to sell packages that included a book that organized the photos together.  Some years ago I had taken Christmas vacation photos, printed them in a Shutterfly book, and given copies to the friends who had also been on the trip.  I realized that could be a good solution here as well.  That decision opened up my creativity.  The next thing I knew my mind was playing with the potential rather than fearing the worst.  I had shifted from negativity to positivity and optimism, from scarcity to abundance.  Even better, I remembered who I was and why I was at the party.  I realized that, while the bride's list had simply been meant to be helpful .... (in fact, the bride had done some work as a wedding photographer and provided me with the list she had always wished her clients had given her) .....  I had twisted it into an edict of duties I had to fulfill to be "A Wedding Photographer." I had forgotten the essential detail.

They hadn't hired "A Wedding Photographer."  Knowing who I was, knowing my work; they had hired me.  Simultaneously I realized something else.  I was so busy trying to figure out how to be what they wanted that I was in very real danger of not giving them what they had requested.

Me.

Like I said, it was one of the best compliments I have ever received in my life.  I have always been a people pleaser.  Essentially the people in my life would tell me either in words or in action what they wanted from me and I would try to fill those shoes.  It had become second nature.  Yet here, at a wedding, which I consider one of the most rigid parties you can ever throw, the powers that be (aka the bride and groom) weren't asking me to jump through standardized hoops.  They were asking me to do what I do naturally.  They were asking me to be me.

I'm not sure life gets any better than that.

I would like to publicly thank Josh and Susan Needleman for giving me the great compliment of asking me to be their wedding photographer.  May your life together be long and blissful.

The book delivers in about a week, but here is a preview of my two favorite pages.

Law of Attraction #3 - A Three Legged Cat Named Sherman

My goal is to be as happy as I can every moment of the rest of my life.  Even if it weren't my distillation of how I see the teachings of Abraham-Hicks, it would be a worthy goal.  There is a big difference between wanting to be happy and not wanting to be unhappy.  I once saw a Simpson's Halloween episode where one of Maggie's dolls had a Good and Evil switch.  The doll hadn't really wanted to kill Homer.  Her switch was simply toggled to evil.  That's what happiness turned out to be for me.  A metaphorical switch in point of view that needed to be flipped.

Even knowing that, it can be difficult to maintain 24/7.  I have had my heart broken a couple of times in my life.  Mostly over the loss of pets.  My goal with a pet is to build a relationship and when one of them passes, I have lost a friend.  One who stood by during the troubling moments of the previous 20 years, give or take a few.  It was with a wary eye at the advancing age of my pets that I whispered into the wind, "When I'm ready for a new pet, the right new friend will arrive."  The idea is not to replace the aging pet, but to introduce new love into my life to dull the sting of loss a little.

Unbeknownst by me, across town a woman named Renee was admiring her downstairs neighbor's kitten.  She noticed when he broke his leg in two places.  She noticed when his owners removed his collar and removed themselves from a place of responsibility for him.  She put herself out on a limb to rescue him and get him some help.

Meanwhile, in my world everyone was getting kittens.  Not "a" kitten, people were suddenly getting them in pairs.  I began to like the idea myself.  They could entertain each other and possibly impact my older kitties less.  Besides, from what I was seeing, two kittens are hilarious!!

I mentioned my plan to a friend, Judy, whose sister is a close friend of Renee's.  By this time, "Mr. Sherbet" had had his leg amputated and would be available for adoption as soon as he had healed enough to do so.  His life seemed to work in one month spans at that point.  A month to rescue him.  A month for him to heal.  It didn't take another month for him to find a home.  The first day he was available for adoption, I signed the papers and brought my newly named "Sherman" home.

Abraham-Hicks talks about "the next logical thing" and that was exactly how Sherman's adoption unfolded.  I whispered what I wanted to the universe and trusted the right thing would happen.  When it did happen, I just took the path it directed.  In the car ride home, I had my first moment of uncertainty.  Sherman tried to chew his way out of the cardboard crate the Human Society provides.  I can remember sitting in the backseat of Judy's car and saying urgently, "Judy, we need to get there soon.  I can see his entire head!"

It's so funny.  My focus had been how to protect the poor three-legged cat from my full grown, big bruiser Peabody.  Suddenly I realized more completely what Sherman had been through.  In two months time, that cat had broken a leg in two places, had it amputated and was going to a new home. This was no shrinking violet cat.  I realized I might have it a bit wrong about who would need protection.

Another month has passed and no one needs any protection from anyone else.  Peabody has accepted Sherman.  Most of the time they even seem to be friends.  Sometimes they even seem like Mr. Peabody and his boy Sherman or like Peabody is satisfied "schooling" the youngster.  When I adopted Sherman, the papers said he was a year and six months old, but he looked and acted too much like a kitten for that to be accurate.  I asked Renee, who knew him the best, and she said the vet told her he was about ten months.

Ten months and two of them were spent having a leg amputated and recovering from the same.

I never doubted the right cat would stroll into my life somehow.  Just as I never doubted that, if I followed the signs and continued taking the next logical step, the best thing would happen.  And it did.

My new friend Sherman limps a little at times, but other times you would barely notice his missing leg.  He doesn't let it stop him from climbing the highest shelves in my house.  He has lost none of his kitten-ish curiosity about his new world.  If life is learning to be happy unconditionally, Sherman is a daily example of taking what life gave you and still finding it sweet.  He definitely enjoys it to the fullest.

I would like to publicly thank Renee and her husband, my friend Judy, the Napa Humane Society and Dr. Randy Lung and California Pet Hospital.  Thank you for saving Mr. Sherbet.  Thank you for bringing me my Sherman and giving me this chance to save him a little too.

Law of Attraction #2 - The Good Life

Once in awhile something will fall into my lap that makes the Law of Attraction not only real, but obviously real to me.  It happened recently when I discovered the Abraham-Hicks Vortex of Attraction Alaskan Cruise 2015, signed up and showed up for it.  Before going, I had marveled how much Abraham must love the cruise workshops.  "They must be like shooting fish in a barrel."  If the goal is to feel as good as you possibly can in every moment, who isn't feeling good on a cruise?"

Although Abraham-Hicks' teachings have taught me not to look at other people's struggles or shortcomings, during the beginning of the cruise, I couldn't help but notice not everyone was feeling as happy and affluent.  Letting my 'monkey mind' play with it awhile, I realized what I had done differently.

We look at the world and life around us and we call it reality.  Just as LeRoy Neiman looked at the pages of "Playboy" and allowed it to make the good life a reality for him, if we want to change our viewpoint in regards to reality, we need to seed that change ourselves.  At the end of the cruise, sitting in a Virgin America First Class seat, I realized that was exactly what I had done.

1.  Although the friend who accompanied me on the cruise has long said "Balcony rooms are a waste.  You're going to spend more time out of the room than in it."  I couldn't help but think that I'd like a view from my room.  I thought too about how crowded it might be on deck while we were passing Alaskan beauty.  I wouldn't have to worry if I was taller than the people around me on my own private deck.  Knowing there are fewer dark night time hours in Alaska during summer, I also thought I might be tempted to go out on my own balcony then.  While I might not be tempted to walk all the way up to the deck.  I opted for my own private balcony.

2.  From water to high end alcohol, Celebrity Cruises have a wide range of drink packages available.  I chose the absolute highest, most expensive and most inclusive one.  Without trying to make sure I accounted for every dollar I had spent, I also made sure that I used it.  Every day I picked up at least one very large bottle of water, as well as a mixed drink I had never tried before or the most expensive glasses of wine on the menu.  It turned out that the "most" expensive glasses of wine actually required a little bit more money than just the drink plan.  Rather than get upset and huffy about that, I simply said, "Ok.  Go ahead and charge me the extra two dollars."  Rather than charge me, my waiter said, "I'm going to let it pass this time.  I just wanted to make sure you were aware of the possibility in case you run into another extra charge drink at one of the other restaurants."  The last day I even tried a Singapore Sling, which was a drink my grandmother used to talk about drinking on her freighter trips when I was a little girl.  When pre-choosing my options, I didn't limit myself.

3.  I signed up for an excursion at every port.  Two of the excursions were Abraham-Hicks exclusives where I got to travel side by side with other workshop attendees.  Two of the excursions were personal victories.  One of them was a Sled Dog Mushing Experience that included a helicopter ride to and from a glacier as well as the chance to be the musher for a team of dogs that train for the Iditarod.

Era Helicopter and Sled Dog Return

Era Alaska Flightseeing Helicopter and Dog Sled Tour - Dog Run - July 5, 2015, taken with GoPro Hero3+

I also went on a zip line excursion in Ketchikan, Alaska, but there is a lot more to that story which I will return to another day.

4.  At the airport while picking up my boarding passes, I was offered an upgrade to first class for $70/each.  You know I took advantage of that.  Besides being one of the first on and off the plane, free champagne and real food rather than pretzels or nuts, hot damp towels, and a seat that had a massage setting, I was rewarded by my companion turning to me mid flight.  "This is fun," he said.

What will you do to make the good life a reality for you?
                     

Law of Attraction #1 - The Colorful T-Shirt

(Today was going to be the first entry in a new blog "Cheerleader of Life," but the site had a massive failure "server not found" and I decided the best thing to do was to publish the blog entry on my already established blog.  So without further ado ... my regular Tuesday blog ....)

Day 2 of the Abraham-Hicks Alaskan Cruise 2015 ...
we are in Ketchikan, Alaska in a gift shop when I see this shirt,

(Shirt sold by http://www.themountain.com.  Artist Dean Russo)

and I love it and grab one to buy ...

but before I get to the cash register ... I see this other shirt.

(Shirt sold by http://www.themountain.com.  Artist Dean Russo)

I reach to grab one of those too, but they don't have my size.

I consider buying the one that is too big .... but I've had a shirt like that before .. you love the image so much ..... you buy something too large ...... and it always feels a bit off ..... and you end up getting rid of it barely ever worn. 

The shop is a real touristy place ... perhaps even one in a chain of shops ..... so I think maybe I will get another chance.

In Juneau, Alaska ..... our excursion 

(mushing a team of sled dogs, but that is another story) 

ends late in the day and I opt out of looking at the gift shops in town.

I am wearing my new husky dog shirt in Skagway, Alaska, our last Alaskan town where I will have feet on the ground, when a man walking towards me from the opposite direction with his own group of friends slaps hands with me as we cross paths. He is wearing not the identical shirt to mine .. but very very close .. obviously the same artist.

None of the shops in Skagway have it or anything similar.

I set the notion aside .. thinking I will google it when I get home.

We have a day and a half at sea followed by our final evening in Victoria BC.

We go on the Abraham Hicks exclusive excursion to Buchart Gardens (which simply means we ride there together as a group.)

We won't get back to the ship until at least 10pm. Dinner, pics, and shopping will all have to fit into our slim window of time. 

(I should admit too. I almost didn't go on the excursion. The Abraham workshop was over having just ended that day. I was considering spending the last of my time on the ship quietly processing everything, but during the break between the last two sessions I met a lady who was local to me in the line for the toilet. She had mentioned other people from my town who were at the workshop. I hadn't met them yet and I thought maybe they would go to the gardens.)

It is a 45 minute drive to the gardens. We hit the ground running. Cameras out. 100 pics or so later, I get really hungry and convince my friend Art it's time to go to the coffee shop. I eat a hot dog. He has some sort of pastries. We eat them sitting at a table between the coffee shop and the gift shop.

As we're eating, I see stained glass items in the window of the gift shop. I begin to feel this excitement or urgency to go there .. so much so that Art has only finished one of his two danishes, but I ask if it is ok if I go in ahead?

He has no problem with it and I do.

I spend a lot of time at the stained glass .. they have this stuff that looks very ... primitively artistic and features cats .... I like them .. but don't love them.

I begin to wander around the shop .. I'm not sure what triggered the .. "I wonder if ..." but sure enough .. yes they had it .... in any size I may have wanted.

Now .. really that was good enough for me ... but .. today when I was talking to Art as he left .. I realized something much larger.

See .. before I left for the trip .. I wanted to bring a t shirt or two .. but I wanted them to be a bit more on the feminine side ... not big like a man's but a little more form fitting .. while not being too tight or revealing.

I have this t shirt I bought on a trip to Arizona .. it is beige and has a coyote on it ... the coyote is very colorful, but in a southwest way.

I had wanted to take that shirt, but it was in my laundry and in the mess of my house 

(my house has been under construction for almost a year now .... but that too .. is another story)

... I couldn't find it.

(Coyote shirt - still rumpled from the laundry where I found it - says only "Gildan Ultra Cotton" on the label)

It is only ...

after witnessing the beauty of Alaska
after soaking in hours of Abraham-Hicks material
after enjoying exciting adventures like zip lining and dog sledding

it is only in a casual conversation with Art ...

that I remember .....

One of the last thoughts I had as I finished packing before the trip ....

"I really want to get a few more t shirts with a colorful animal on the front."

• 

Shifting to Harmony

"Happiness is when what you think, what you say and what you do are in harmony."

Mahatma Gandi

My coach Gil McIff would say the cause of suffering is man's lack of awareness of his true nature.  It isn't an obvious point at first, but that is essentially the same thing Gandi was saying here.  In other words, due to our lack of understanding, what we think, say and do can never quite be in harmony.  Abraham-Hicks would say we feel discomfort because we are not in alignment with our source.  We are not in alignment with our true nature.

From childhood to current day, I have been a lot of different Angela(s.)  Angry Angela(s.)  Sad Angela(s.)  Happy Angela(s.)  Each generation of Angela is more loving, more confident and happier.  I am so grateful I am the sort of person who embraces the opportunities to grow and change as well as a person who navigates through the harder changes always emerging better for having ridden out the storm.

More so than at any other time in my life, I know who I am and I know what I need to do.  For years I have compared myself to others.  Even after the years where I let myself emotionally fall short, I compared thinking others would benefit from the things I was learning.  I have transitioned from evangelist to coach to a fully realized individual continually on the path of being.  More and more what I think, what I say and what I do are in harmony.

From a score of philosophical teachings and teachers, I have discovered a few principles to guide me along my path:

1.  As much as possible, follow a path of least resistance.  One of the things that always shook my life up in a bad way was my need to take action, particularly in the forum of needing to speak up, explain or defend myself.  A lot of poorly advised phone and email conversations happened even though it might have been a technical struggle to complete them.  It was like I was given dozens of tiny little chances to change my mind and yet I still pushed through them full steam nearly always to my later regret.

I don't do that anymore.

Back when I was a darkroom photographer, I noticed that some days photographic printing was a struggle.  The harder I tried to fight through; the deeper the pile of wasted photographic paper that ended up in the trash.  I learned that sometimes the answer was to pack it up, go home, and try again tomorrow.  The path of least resistance is found by grounding yourself in the present moment, being open to the opportunities, but not forcing anything.  I have realized that even no action is essentially an action and that I really can't do anything wrong.  What I once would have considered a mistake that impacted my life in a detrimental way, I now consider an opportunity for learning and growth.  I am not the underdog struggling to keep up.  In a very real sense I am the creator of my world and my personal existence and I have adapted the creative lessons of my "real world" writing and photography.  Creations struggled over remain less satisfying because if nothing else, it is hard to determine when to stop.  The best creations are effortless, flowing out of you as easily as your own personal scent.

2.  I have learned, rather than troubleshooting my life and continually looking for potential problems, I am the creator of my existence.  What I look for I will see.

I'm a big fan of the Walt Disney Company and I have been to their parks many times.  In a very real way, Disneyland is a microcosm of the larger world.  Here is a place that exists to entertain, to kindle the fading embers of your childlike joy.  Yet all around you there are people troubleshooting the problems.  Complaining about the crowds or expense.  I have never heard it better addressed than the cast member I witnessed who was trying to direct a large traffic of people through an already congested area, who said:

"Remember why you came here."

I have come to believe I didn't come here to look for holes in the dykes in which to stick my finger.  I didn't come here to tell any emperor(s) they had been hoodwinked into wearing nudity.  I came here to live a human lifetime.  I came here to be alive.  

All that troubleshooting and complaining we think protects us from danger, simply draws that which we don't want to us.  At the same time it delivers a numbing sameness which may feel protective in times of struggle, but which dulls vibrancy and blocks us from joy.  We freeze out our own potential for happiness in our attempts to protect ourselves from pain.  

If what I see is what I look for, I have decided to saturate my environment with textures I find enriching and beautiful.  If what I see is what I look for, I have decided to look for the silver lining in every cloud.

3.  "The rich get richer and the poor get poorer" I have come to understand as a byproduct of the Law of Attraction.  If we believe we are rich in abundance and things come to us easily, we are and they do.  If we believe we are poor and in competition for scarcity and that life is hard, we are and it is.  

I need to show some gratitude to my mother on this point.  No matter her personal struggles, she always told me "things always work out for you."  Even before I understood the mechanics of why it is so, I found comfort in the awareness.  I found comfort in hearing it and in telling it to myself.  We believe the stories we tell ourselves.  We believe them and our belief causes them to be true.  My understanding of this has forever transitioned my self talk from one of "Life sucks and then you die" sarcasms to one of self soothing pep talks.  I can be and have so much more than I ever knew because I have already witnessed it time and time again.  

4.  I have learned that trying to siphon self esteem and confidence from other people's praise and opinions is like trying to use it to fill a gas tank with a hole in it.  No amount can ever fill it and unless or until I find its source within myself, it will remain empty.  

Near the time of my divorce, I saw Albert Brooks' movie "Defending Your Life."  I recognized the main character's fear-driven life struggles as not being dissimilar to my own.  Not liking the picture that painted for my future, I decided to be brave.  The first thing I did was go with some friends to a place called Moaning Cave in Vallecito, California.  Today they have more things you can do there than then, but at the time, you could choose to either descend a staircase or rappel down into the cave.  I went there with the very specific purpose of rappelling. 

After overcoming the fear based sensations of needing to use the toilet and worrying I may throw up, I found myself dangling by a rope in a huge cavern in full view of the optional staircase.  I was completely over my fear and I was sort of wishing the rope ride down moved a little faster when I heard someone on the staircase notice me and say, "I could never do that."  In that moment, I could remember feeling the same.  Simultaneously, I knew how little effort it took to do it and inwardly I revelled at the awareness I had extended that effort and was doing it.  I had transitioned from the Angela who couldn't do it to the Angela who could.  

Self confidence comes from achievements.  It comes from being able to look at something and tell yourself, "I did that."  

My beginning path as a coach was the same as the rest of my life.  I looked for the pitfalls and tried to troubleshoot clients' lives.  I have come to understand, by simply observing and assessing a client's life status and determining that he/she needs to make some changes does us both a disservice.  It is the equivalent of viewing them in a negative way.  In my portion of our co-creation of existence I am seeing them as coming from a position of lack and having made mistakes.  I cannot drag them to my higher position in that way.  Worse, by simply viewing and focusing on the negative, I am far more likely to fall back myself.  Tread once again through waters in which I have already been.  

That's where I find myself today.  

It is time to no longer tell you the stories of where I have been and what I have overcome.  I am and always will be the woman who wants to share her successes with you.  I am and always will be the woman who wants to drag everybody into the lifeboat with her.  The difference is I am no longer willing to see my words as some sort of lifeboat of advice, I am no longer willing to see you as being in any sort of distress or struggle, and I am no longer willing to dive down into the murkiness of my past or my past unhappiness to try and achieve the unachievable.  If I am going to lead, let it be by example.  

It is time to embrace who I am deep inside, a sort of cheerleader of life.  With that in mind, I am crafting a new blog*.  I want it to be exhilarating with stories of rappelling, zip lining, sled dog racing, and perhaps even scuba diving.  I want it to be stories of joy and appreciation.  I want it to be stories that catch the attention of those people walking down the stairs rather than rappelling.  

Maybe, just maybe .... if I share the stories where I take pleasure in being alive .... I can get just one of them to whisper ...

"maybe"

*New blog is already in construction and should begin the first or second week of July 2015.  

Just Stop Talking About It

My life has been positively exploding with opportunities lately!  I have been remodeling my house and so many things began falling into place people pointed out to me I was almost building an entirely new house!  Now, as I decorate the reconfigured rooms, each stroke of paint seems to make me feel just a tiny bit more alive and excites me.   A friend told me it was like I was building my own personal Wonderland.  I couldn't have said it better myself.

At the same time, opportunities for travel are opening up.  I have friends in both London and Paris who have a guest bedroom available.  I visited New Orleans for Mardi Gras this year and in a little over a month I will be in Alaska.  That was a big Law of Attraction moment of delight.  I have been talking about wanting to go to Alaska since the 90's.  Recently, I have been saying I would like to try a cruise, maybe a theme cruise for added entertainment, and after friends went to another workshop since the retreat we attended together, I decided the next workshop I would like to attend would be one with Abraham and Esther Hicks.

Yes I am.  I am going on an Alaskan Cruise with Abraham and Esther Hicks.  After talking with my two friends, on a complete whim I googled some sort of mixture of Abraham-Hicks, workshop and cruise and found an outline of an experience that could have been lifted right off from my vision board.  Including the port visit attractions.  Even with all that, I still messaged a friend who has been to an Abraham-Hicks Caribbean Cruise.  He said, "If you asked me if I would do it again, I would answer, 'In a heartbeat."  Excited almost isn't a large enough word for how I feel.

So I'm immersing myself in Abraham-Hicks teachings.  I would really like a chance on "The Hot Seat" and even though it is probably next to impossible given how long Abraham has been answering Hot Seat questions, but I would like to ask a new one.  I would like to identify the best question I could ask Abraham for my own behalf AND nudge the discussion a little further along.  As I listen to Abraham-Hicks audiobooks and youtube presentations, I have already had my first potential questions answered and I'm becoming pretty well versed in Abraham's Law of Attraction point of view.

If you find yourself unhappy with your life and the opportunities that are presenting themselves to you, the answer is in the question.  Don't understand?  Voice the question you would ask Abraham to yourself lightly.  Is it something along the lines of:

Where is my soul mate?  The love of my life?

Why am I not more successful?

Where is my slice of happiness?

So far the number one takeaway I have from all of my Abraham-Hicks studies is the importance of being happy and having a positive attitude.  The things you want in your life that aren't there are held back by your own repetition of complaint they are missing.  The more you keep "beating the drum" (as Abraham would say) of the bad things that have happened to you; the more you push all of the good things you've been wanting away.  You attract not what you want, not your opposite, but exactly what you are.  The next time you complain about that dimwit fellow employee or that road raged driver who cut you off?  Consider this.  According to Abraham, they didn't just drop into your lap.  You actively attracted them.  So if you find yourself surrounded by bad tempered, combative people, you might want to do an emotional self check.  You want to aim for a high frequency to attract a high frequency item.  You need to be authentically happy to attract more happiness to your life.  

Authentic happiness.  You can't complain about all that baggage, cross your fingers behind your back and say, "Just kidding."  The universe doesn't listen to what you are saying.  It reads the emotional frequency you are broadcasting.  So if you are in a "the world sucks and then you die" place, guess what world you will attract?  

But "misery loves company" right?  We think it feels good to complain to others and get recognition and confirmation of our position.  We feel validated, but do we really feel better?  Or is it like the junk food aisle of happiness?  A temporary, not very filling alternative that frequently leaves us no better than we started after our sympathetic audience has departed?  

There used to be a joke something along the lines of "Why do I bang my head against the wall?"  "Because it feels so good when I stop."   But it's not really a joke.  It's the way life works.  If your life isn't working, you are metaphorically banging your head against things and asking when this pain in your head will go away.  Stop and it will go away.

I've been studying the Law of Attraction for a few years now and that's what I've been trying to do.  I know I've had times where I have found it impossible NOT to drone on about the bad things that have happened in my life.  I remember the feelings of needing to explain.  The feelings of needing to be understood.  Some time not that long ago, a friend gifted me with one of the most important things I needed to hear to begin the process to stop.  

"You talk like you're the only person that has ever happened to."

I immediately recognized the truth in what he was saying because it was also how I felt.  The fact that my friend had had similar experiences and had not talked about them like I did was startling and liberating.  

You don't need to tell everyone your story.  You don't need to explain.  You don't need to justify.  You don't need to set up a context for who you are now or who you want to be.  According to Abraham, all you need to do is, in this moment, find the happiest, highest frequency you can reach.  In the next moment?  Find the happiest, highest frequency you can reach.  Repeat.  Repeat.  Repeat.  Don't beat yourself up when you find yourself slipping.  Slowly make your way to an emotional place where you feel better.  If you feel better, you have raised your frequency.  

Salt your world with music that inspires you, colors that soothe you, textures that comfort you.  Hug, squeeze and breathe in the people and creatures who you love.  Learn to focus your attention on the world you love rather than the news that scares you.  Try this.  Have you ever been driving, your favorite song comes on the radio, you're singing along and all of the sudden, another car cuts you off?  By the time your hearing for anything beyond your own cussing has returned, it is three songs later.  Right?  

There are no fewer than a thousand reasons you cannot be privy to that may have caused the driver to behave as he did.  Your judgement about him is based on you and your fear and has little to do with him.  You don't even know him.  Meanwhile, you didn't die and your favorite song is still on the radio.  I'd say your best and happiest course of action, and the one that will benefit your future the most, would be to keep on singing.  

Stop talking about everything you hate and give some airtime to everything you love.  

So, I Took a Walk Yesterday

That isn't such a big deal.  I took a walk the day before too.  With a friend.  At about 2:30 in the afternoon.   The big deal is that I took one of those things I've been meaning to do and did it.  I don't know about you and your life, but in my life, I seem to see significant changes every half year or so.  One of my more recent changes is in my sleep patterns.  I fall asleep pretty early most nights, sometimes waking up in the insomniac time zones of the night only to realize the reason I'm awake is because I've already gotten enough sleep.  Seven hours is seven hours whether you wake at 7:00am or 4:00am.  For a week or two now I have felt twitchy.  It's as if my body is trying to tell me I have been neglecting it.  I keep hearing friends who talk about morning walks.  They sound really good, but the time always seems to slip away leaving me once again ready for bed without having ever taken that walk.

Not only did I take a walk, by myself, but I took it at 6:30am.

For the first three blocks I was still on the fence as to whether I wanted to walk or not.  The air was cold enough I was still a bit chilly even in my sweat clothes.  I had only walked by my neighbor's house before my left foot felt like I had extended it too far and I had a sharp pain in the arch.  I usually wear Chuck's.  If I'm not in my slip on Converse shoes, I'm probably barefoot.  I've never understood how shoes I essentially "live in" can suddenly become uncomfortable just because I do something a little out of the normal like take a walk or go to a convention or a theme park.  I kept walking.

Three more blocks and I'm off my street.  I told myself two blocks ago the only reason my left foot hurt is because I'm focusing my attention on it.  Think of something else.  Listen to the birds.  I can feel the cool air in my throat and bronchial passage.  I'm unsettled by my breathing becoming a bit more labored and I struggle with my inner critical voice who decides now would be a good time to tell me I'm a loser who never works out and who looks like a potato.  My right foot starts to hurt.  I keep walking.

Three more blocks.  Whether they are now successfully "warmed up" or "stretched out," neither foot hurts anymore.  I'm far enough now that going back home and "forgetting this ever happened" is no longer an option.  If I cave in and quit early, I will remember.  If I succeed and finish my planned route, I will remember.  I keep walking.

I walk through the exhaust stream of a car warming up just before I pass my friend's house.  My route is roughly based on our walks together.  Just past her house is the half way mark.  Neither foot hurts and I have warmed up enough that my sweatshirt seems almost unnecessary.  I've been walking a slightly wider, more busy street on the border of my neighborhood, now I turn and head into the interior streets.  Immediately I notice it is even quieter.  It is almost as if I am the only person awake.  I feel almost like an intruder.  Except for another empty car left running to warm it up, the only other life present is a cat trying to keep warm at the end of a driveway and a crow who seems to want to chase me off his street with his persistent cawing.  I pull out my phone, take a picture of the cat and a tree I admire in one of the front yards, and continue walking.

Three more blocks.  I'm closer to home than not, but on a different street than I usually use when in my car.  Nothing hurts.  I'm feeling good and I'm taking in the scenery as I pass it.  My inner voice, no longer trying to abuse me, is full of "that house is a pretty color" or "I wonder when they added the extended porch to that house."  After another three blocks, my confidence is high, I feel almost like a veteran walker and I can see my house in the distance.

Walking up the steps to my house, I picture myself flopping into a chair and relaxing.  As I open the front door, my cat, an even greater creature of habit than myself, is startled by the unusual activity and puffs twice his size.  (The front door at my house doesn't usually open before 8am and that is usually after he has requested it verbally in a variety of meows.)  Honestly, I don't remember what I did next.  I know it wasn't flop in a chair.  I kept active.  I kept moving.  A certain momentum had begun and I seemed reluctant to let it end.  What I do remember was how my legs felt the rest of the day.  Relaxed, moving smoothly, gracefully.  They felt happy about the morning's events.

I think that's how change works.  You have to fight past your natural resistances.  Your ego/mind wants to protect you and will sling a bunch of abuse at you to discourage you.  It can't see any dangers in your comfort zone.  It doesn't know that living your life with box-like limitations is very .....  well ..... limiting.  If you can distract yourself long enough to get past the initial discomfort and internal naysaying, you surprise yourself by doing things you've never done before.  Frequently with ease.  You might even actually enjoy yourself.  Still, for awhile, the next time will require the same effort.  It will require remembering how good my legs felt rather than thinking how cold the air feels or that my left foot has started the journey unhappy again.  I know too that, if I can keep this up for four weeks, at the end of that time I will be a walker.  It will become a habit.  At this point, it is mine to decide whether I want it or not.  I'm a big believer in occasionally assessing "what do I want out of life?" and then going out and getting it.  Now, if you'll excuse me, I think I'd like to take a walk.

The Levels of Consciousness

I need to preface this blog entry by saying you are never responsible for someone else's feelings.  The influence or contamination of emotional feelings that I describe in the blog can both happen to others encountering you as well as to you when you encounter others.  What I am always trying to shine a light on is that, just because you may be having a rough day or going through a bad patch, YOU DO NOT HAVE TO BE UNHAPPY.  Emotions are good.  They are our special gauges that tell us whether we are living life in a way that is happy and fulfilling or constrictive and disheartening.  But just like a gauge in our car that tells us our car needs service, we don't simply leave the triggered gauge on red and talk about it for hours, days or weeks on end.

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There is a chart that can be found across the internet, based on Dr. David Hawkins work, which assigns a numeric value to all of our emotions.  The Levels of Consciousness chart.  They developed the numbers via kinesiology or muscle testing.

Now in the Law of Attraction, we learn that like attracts like.  In other words, a high energy frequency attracts a high energy frequency and a low attracts a low.

I was thinking about past relationships and arguments or bad moments that I've had and suddenly I could actually visualize exactly what had happened using The Levels of Consciousness Chart.

Joy is at 540 on that chart and Love is at 500.  Lets call the combination of those two "Happiness" and rather than a numeric value, let's give it a color.  Red.  Fear is at 100 on the chart and Desire is at 125.  Let's call the combination of those two "Getting Your Self Worth from Others" and give it the color blue.  Anger is at 150.  Let's give it the color purple.

In the scenario I was thinking about, a friend and I were together.  Laughing and having a good time. If you could see each of us as glowing in our level of consciousness colors, I'm sure we both would have been red.  Keep in mind, like attracts like.  We're both happy and we are supporting each other at that energy level.  Maintaining it by attracting it back and forth.  I drift out of the moment.  Something happens that makes me think of the past or triggers my lack of self worth and I begin talking to my friend, not from our red place of "Happiness," but from my blue place of "Getting Your Self Worth From Others."

Like attracts like.  In this situation, a few things can happen depending on my companion's resilience levels and skills at resisting others negative emotions.

Because that's what I've done.  I've introduced negativity into the room.  I've done it innocently enough.  I have left the present moment and my ego is running my "Getting Your Self Worth From Others" program.  It actually represents me, slipping from "Happiness" and attempting to reestablish myself there.  I suddenly feel bad and I'm attempting to feel better.

It can never happen.  It is the equivalent of trying to make a dish less salty by adding more salt.

I've introduced negativity into the room and I've broken our attraction.  If my friend is very resilient and has very good skills at resisting, he or she will probably excuse him or herself from the equation and leave the room.  If my friend is very patient and  empathetic, he or she might cajole me back to "Happiness," but I could just as easily drag my friend down.

Downward emotional stations from "Happiness" or Joy and Love on The Levels of Consciousness Chart would be Reason, Acceptance, Willingness, Neutrality, Courage, Pride, Anger, and finally, Desire and Fear or "Getting Your Self Worth From Others."  Some of those may not sound all that bad, but keep in mind they are lower than "Happiness."  In terms of emotional pain or discomfort, lower energy levels don't feel as good as higher ones.  If my friend is very susceptible to negative emotions, I may even drag him or her lower to Grief, Apathy, Guilt or Shame.  In the scenario I was thinking about, I dragged my friend to anger and we had an argument.  I converted us to colors rather than numbers because I think it is a good visual representation.  My friend was red.  I was blue.  He or she took on a bit of my blue and became purple.  Angry.

Now consider this.  You've had a bad day at work.  You come home and your loved ones, your family, are all laughing and having a good time.  They are buzzing along, red and in the 500's and you inject yourself into them, gruff and complaining, somewhere under 200.  The very best you can hope for is that they will draw you up to their level, but you are running the risk of dragging them down.  You are making yourself a burden.  It is as if your entire family was required to carry a certain amount of weight and, instead of carrying yours, you redistribute it among the rest of your family.  I'd like to think you'd never do that. I'd like to think that you would rather take on some of your loved one's burdens than willingly place yours upon their backs.

There is a popular self help meme across the internet.

"Never put the keys to your happiness in someone's pocket."

We tend to look at that from a very self centered viewpoint.  I want to be happy and I can't depend on anyone else to make me happy.    

1.  You can't "make" anyone do anything.  Just as no one can "make" you do anything.  In reality, when someone else has done something and you respond by being happy.  It was your choice to respond in that way.  Understanding this means understanding you also have the potential to choose to be happy at any time you like.  No matter what circumstances are unfolding around you.

2.  Your moods and your life are your own responsibility.  No one else's.  One of the reasons you can't put the keys to your happiness in someone else's pocket is because they are responsible for their own happiness.  No one can be or should be burdened with your happiness as well as their own.  

But what can I do?"  You might say.  "I feel however I feel.  I can't control my emotions."

There are actually a lot of things you can do.  Consider my example.  I said "I drift out of the moment."  By that I mean, I drift out of the present moment.  Instead of being present and actively interacting with my friend, I have allowed my mind to drift.  Probably to the past since what it netted was insecurity and negativity.  Whatever things happened to you at work, they are not present with you when you arrive home with your family.  They can only be there, if you drag them there.  One thing you could do is meditate and cultivate practices that enable you to be more present. You could work to make yourself more resilient and resistant.  You could do this by exploring your emotions, understanding why you feel like you feel and make peace with your demons from the past.  Or you could consider the possibility that, in order to feel happy, we must think happy thoughts and consciously decide to be happy.

One of the quickest routes to being happy?  Do something nice for someone else.  You can't "make" them happy, but you just might "make" yourself happy in the process.

Communication

I've been remodeling my house.  Most of it is skeletal.  The things a house needs to remain upright and insurable.  Right now, I'm refinishing the old floors.  Even that touches a part of my brain that tags it as necessary.  If the floors are left to weather from their already weathered state, in another ten or twenty years, I may not be considering whether or not they are pretty, but rather whether they are structurally sound.  I have been living in the house during the work and I have discovered the depths of my patience.  Meanwhile, my cat Peabody hates it.

At the moment, one side of the house is cut off from the other side of the house while the floor finish dries.  Peabody, who I rescued from the neighborhood almost never has any interest in going outside, but is seriously bothered by his current lack of mobility.  I wish I could just whisper in his ear and he would understand.

"It's ok Sweet "P".  It's only for another few days.  You'll get your mobility back."

This morning I realized I was wishing for an event with an animal that rarely even happens between humans.  To communicate and be understood.  To listen and understand.  We think we do.  Probably we even come close most of the time, but then we have those moments.  Those stark uncomfortable moments where we suddenly become aware we are talking to a friend who has become a stranger.  Viewing each other across a chasm of uncertainty and strangeness, we can't help but eventually wonder if we ever had a real dialogue at all.   

Consider this.  I have been talking with an old friend from school on Facebook.  We are finding more similarities than differences between us.  We both believe in growing and changing and improving.  We both believe choosing happiness is the answer.  We've flirted a little.  The other day, after a few weeks of this, his daughter friended me on Facebook. 

Let me stop for a moment and ask you.  Why did his daughter friend me on Facebook?  What do you think?  Figure it out and remember your answer.  

When I told him, he sounded surprised.  I told him that he had probably mentioned my name a few too many times and his daughter was protecting him.  Checking out what trouble he might be getting himself into.  He made a "hmmm" noise and said, "She is friends with a lot of my friends."  I took it as confirmation for a moment or two and then I realized I was doing it again.  If my goal was a dialogue.  If my goal was communication.  This wasn't it.  This was simply playing the B-roll of the amalgamation of my life's viewpoint.   Wherever it is that I am now having intentionally drifted from where my parents raised me to be.  The viewpoint-colored glasses that observed their close relationship and chose to see a loving daughter protecting her dad.  (I have reached the point where my glasses are colored in benign loving world tints.)  

What did you think?  I know you can't tell me, but I challenge you to consider this.  Your answer tells you nothing about me, nothing about her, and everything about you.  Ask yourself this.

What are the glasses I use to view the world tinted with?  Do you view the world in a happy benevolent way?  Or is the world more sinister and inscrutable?  Because what you see is not necessarily all that is there, but it is what you will get.  

Learning from Outlander's The Devil's Mark (SPOILER ALERT)

This morning I was watching Outlander on my DVR.  This morning I saw Jamie's reaction to Claire's Time Travel story.  I saw his reaction to her admission that she had tried to go back to her own time and her husband, after being married to him.

For those who aren't familiar with the show, Claire is transported from her own 20th century to Jamie's 18th century.  She is married to a man in her own time period who looks very much like the bad guy in Jamie's time period.  On television, the viewer has actually spent more time with the actor as the bad guy rather than the husband, so if I'm average, I'm all for her staying in the past with Jamie.

Perhaps it was with a lifetime of silly romances under my belt that I winced a little when Claire admitted she had tried to get home to her husband AFTER being married to Jamie.

"Oh.  Don't say it like that!"

But I was in for a surprise.  Jamie asks if Claire was trying to return to her time and husband and rather than going to a place where he complained that he meant so little to her, he looked grief-stricken as he said,

"and I beat you for it."

You notice what he did there?  He didn't make it about himself.  Rather than look to where life affected him, he earnestly tried to put himself in Claire's shoes.  

I myself can't count the number of times, in the face of a loved one and confrontation, I've looked to where life affected me rather than being like Jamie.  But if I were to make a list of all the things I love about me, at the very top would be the fact that I have been able to do it sometimes..  

It's not about right, wrong or anything being a sin.  It's about living your life in a way where you can be happiest.  You can be happiest when the people who surround you are happiest and all of that happens when everybody stops looking for where there is shortcoming.

Rather than whine about her leaving him, Jamie delivered his wife to the spot she needed to be to do just that.  As a husband and a lover, he acted selflessly and put her needs before his own.  It was a beautiful moment, even if it only happened in fiction.  That sort of love requires not just a willingness to be vulnerable, but an acceptance that sometimes I will be hurt.

All weekend I've been thinking of a friend of mine.  I know him to be a dog person even though he hasn't owned as much as one pet during the entire time I've known him.  I know because he has told me a story of his two dogs and how they died.  He has told me he was so heartbroken he could never own a dog again.  That is how we normally behave.  We get hurt and we build a list of things to avoid so we are never hurt again.  We will be hurt again.  It is unavoidable.  When we guard ourselves from everything that may hurt us, it is love that gets shut out.  Consider my friend.  By never owning another pet, he shut himself off from all of the love and happiness a dog would bring. Worse, he kept his love away from dogs who badly needed a home and for what?  Did it make him any happier?  Did it remove the pain he felt from loving a creature and losing it?  No.  I think it would be more accurate to say it memorialized his pain and kept it precious.  Rather than allowing it to fade to a memory, it kept the emotion alive.  We cling to pain in order to avoid pain.

Consider this.  When you lock a door to keep something undesireable out, you barr anything good from coming in too.

What I see most in response to the Outlander episode, is a revival of the saying:

If you love someone, set them free.  If they come back to you, they're yours.  If they don't come back, they were never yours in the first place.

The problem with that is our traditional interpretation of the saying.  Generally we see it as proof of love, when really it is an instruction in how to love.  If you love someone, set them free.  Allow them to be who they are and do what they have to do.  That oh-so-judgemental second part?  The one about whether or not they were yours?  I see it as reassurance.  You see, if you allow someone to be free that also includes the freedom to stay with you.

My mother used to have a cat.  I can remember going to her room to ask her something when she wasn't feeling well and being told "Shut the door!  Don't let the cat out!"  Now I myself have two indoor cats that I have said nearly the same thing about.  The difference is my mother was locking her cat in the same room with her.  The other difference?  When you opened my mom's door?  Her cat wanted out.  He wanted freedom.  That's the way our pets were when I was growing up.  We controlled them and they resisted us.  As an adult, I have made other choices.  Right now I am sitting in my bedroom with two cats, neither of which have to be here because I have trapped them with a door.  The final difference?  You will never ever feel as loved as you do when a creature, human or animal, chooses to stay with you when they have the freedom to leave.