Wisdom

Nothing Works

“I’ve tried EVERYTHING!”  It’s the tried and true refrain that starts most every advertisement for house cleaning products and gadgets.  Of course, there’s this one magical product that is the solution to the problem and will magically make life make sense: Amazmaflagicum! …Details

Oh The Drama!

We are social beings and as such have social “knee jerk reactions” to situations that are common to pretty much all of us.  One of these is to hide our emotional vulnerability.  Being vulnerable can make us prey to others who are not, can be detrimental to our social status, can open us up to all kinds of negative interactions. …Details

Mean What You Say

If I wanted oblique references to things I’d talk with a politician.  If I wanted spin I’d talk to a car salesman.  If I wanted to be passively aggressively encouraged to do something, I’d take in more advertising.  Mean what you say and say what you mean, not that you have to be mean about it. …Details

Well I’m Doing It…

Ever heard that saying “The Letter of the Law” ?  You know, where there is wiggle room for interpreting what something means so the person does the minimum required to fulfill their obligation?  Kids do this all the time.  Clean up the yard becomes they raked 3 leaves, clean your room means everything on the floor got pushed into a pile and the pile got put in the closet, take a bath requires the additional instructions of using both soap AND water…  Think it’s any different for adults? …Details

Time Out

Sometimes what we need is a time out.  Not as a punishment, but as a break.  We don’t need to be in the now, we don’t need to find something to make us happy, we don’t need to figure out the next thing, we don’t need to examine our feelings, see if we’re meeting expectations, take another step towards the goal, make progress, be there for others, pay attention to what we’re thinking or doing…  We just need a time out.…Details

I’ve Heard All This Before

There’s an assumption out there that if you haven’t found the answer yet, you aren’t looking hard enough.  If you haven’t resolved the problem you’re not working hard enough.  This could be true and I’ve run across people who are in that boat, but, like most things, this assumption is not one-size-fits-all and shouldn’t be applied to people as if it is.  …Details

Cooperating With Your Best Life

Sometimes manifesting your best life is exactly the wrong thing to do.  *gasp*  I know.  Heresy.  I’ll wait for you to calm yourself.  Breath….again….ready?  Sometimes the best thing we can do is get out of own way.  This is not to say we should just sit down and wait for our best life to come and find us, but that we should stop telling our best life what it should look like and how it should act and when it should show up. …Details

The Achievement Engine

We are taught to be productive.  Most of us will learn to do this for others, fulfilling tasks set for us by employers, but also for groups and family because that’s what’s expected of us.  We’ll take on the roles and the jobs and the masks that people have told us to and will become achievement engines which grind out amazing amounts of product, meeting goal after goal year after year, all to make enough money to do what we want, have what we want, but never being what we want.…Details

Depression – What Can I Do?

Often we feel helpless in the face of someone’s depression.  We don’t know to do or what we can do.  Many times people are well meaning but make things worse by trying to “help” the person look on the bright side, which invalidates their feelings and can just make them feel worse. …Details

Filling the Parental Void

It can seem like we’re the only one who had a parent or parents who were unable to parent us adequately.  Even more so if there was abuse or neglect or dysfunction involved.  Unfortunately this is not an unusual occurrence and so there are large numbers of us trying to heal wounds left from childhoods that were less than stellar at a minimum.…Details