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Showing posts with label spiritual growth. Show all posts
Showing posts with label spiritual growth. Show all posts
BS'D 8 Tishrei, 5779 I am mourning the murder of an acquaintance yesterday, and recovering from the fact that on Saturday/Shabbat afternoon, my neighbors and I were evacuated to safety by police while sappers dealt with a potentially explosive situation literally outside the entrance of where I live. Someone had placed a suspicious object there, and disappeared. Bullhorned police requests to claim the item were not answered. That indicated a dangerous situation for everyone on my street. Jews usually spend the 10 days between Rosh HaShana and Yom Kipur in deep, spiritual contemplation and restorative behavior. Our lifelong goal is to become refined, compassionate beings who improve the world at large. However, Jews around the world are facing rising hatred. Here in Israel we've dealt with months, literally months, of arson. Our farms, forests, and other properties have been set ablaze, thousands of acres burned. Other acts of visceral hatred have happened around the globe this past year. We've literally spent our year in life and death situations. I pray that humanity will lose its hatred for anything. The 10 Commandments tell us not to commit specific crimes, though they have been perpetrated daily since that momentous day at Sinai.
May GOD bless the world with serenity, safety, healing, and security. I will be offline the next few days. Yom Kipur begins tomorrow night and ends the following night. I will spend time from now until then in prayer, meditation, and relaxation (so that I can better withstand the 25-hour fast from food and drink coming up). May your year be filled with health and healing inside and out. Buy the E-book or print edition of EMPOWER Yourself to Cope with a Medical Challenge.
Face Your Medical Problems with Dignity.
Face Your Future with Optimism.
Fill your actions with peaceful purpose.
B'SD 13 Shvat, 5777 I am about to have corrective surgery on one hand. I'll need to stay off the keyboard awhile as the wound heals.
Before I take a necessary medical break, I'd like to share an insight with you. My vital signs have been checked, and that happened shortly after I'd literally run across a large distance to distribute necessary medical papers at different offices. The nurse was impressed that my heart rate, pulse and breathing were rather close to my relaxed state, so I demonstrated to her what happens when I meditate. She whistled while watching the numbers decrease to my usual status.
That took years of practice!
When you face a serious medical or mental health challenge, some sort of daily stress or any type of nuisance, you have a choice: Dwell on it or focus on what can go right, what is in your power to control. That leads to the ability to choose acceptance, not to worsen an already difficult situation. Not sure about that? Listen to this fascinating story about confidence, faith in The One Above. Your emotions are real. Face them with honesty. Calm yourself with pro-active thought, actions and attitudes. Even when times are tough. Emotional maturity is your gateway to ever-better coping skills. Buy the E-book or print edition of EMPOWER Yourself to Cope with a Medical Challenge. Face Your Medical Problems with Dignity.
Face Your Future with Optimism.
Fill your efforts with positive emotions and actions.
B'SD 28 Tevet, 5777 I've had a busy week or two since last Thursday, enough stress from demands on my time and presence to leave me feeling tired. It's as if I'm tired enough for two weeks of hard work! But I'm happy to have something nice to show for all my efforts: Assisting with the joyous celebrations for a friends' marriage, helping children who needed my time, and life-coaching a client or two (more, actually) while managing to keep my kitchen busy and my exercise regimen. I even met some journalistic deadlines. You can read the results here, here and here. Certified in spiritual chaplaincy and counseling skills, I've worked with several mental health methods and practitioners. I addressed a convention of mental health therapists several years ago (talk about feeling pressured!). Keep looking for my input at the e-counselingsite. Let me know here, or there, what you think of the ideas I present. Buy the E-book or print edition of EMPOWER Yourself to Cope with a Medical Challenge. Face Your Medical Problems with Dignity.
Face Your Future with Optimism.
Fill your heart and soul with supportive information.
B'SD 6 Tevet, 5776 I do 1:1 coaching with ill people, sometimes with perfectly healthy people. And they tend to come up with the same questions: "How will I know when I'm making progress?" and "How can I have a relationship with GOD, Who let this happen to me?"
My answer is to trust your heart.
Spirituality, and a relationship, are multifaceted experiences. Both are about transcending your limitations and becoming a better you. You know you're on the right track when you feel joy, a sense of satisfaction and the certainty of emotional growth, all at different times but sometimes all at once. Friends, family and colleagues might even give you some delightful feedback about the positive changes they notice in you.
Keep a journal (as suggested in theEMPOWER Yourself to Cope with a Medical Challengebook). Note the times that you feel pain, agonized, uncertain, and when you feel the positive emotions. Talk to GOD out loud. Even a sigh will do. Life is a matter of balance. Do what you can to keep yours, and cherish the pleasant parts of life. They can keep us going past indescribable pain. Be sure to focus on what's going right, and especially on when it seems that GOD gave you a hug of some sort. Go on. Buy a notebook or use one sitting around somewhere in your home.
Record your accomplishments.
And enjoy them. Buy the E-book or print edition of EMPOWER Yourself to Cope with a Medical Challenge. Face Your Medical Problems with Dignity.
Face Your Future with Optimism.
Fill your mind and heart with optimism. On purpose.
B'SD 2 Tevet, 5776 Today's the last day of Hanuka 5776, and I'm basking in the glow of many wonderful warm memories of the party I threw this week. Over 50 celebrants shared the light of a wonderful holiday with me. Here are a few of the many photos I took, a fond look at life, loved ones, and the future before me.
I am grateful for the blessing of marvelous friends of many nationalities and outlooks, and the ability to be a hostess. It's been a long, hard effort to reach this reality. It came with focused effort, spiritual growth, and a refusal to surrender to pain, dismissive medical mindsets and other setbacks. I hope that I have helped other people to see better realities along the way.
Find out what you can accomplish when you walk the walk and talk the talk advocated in
Learn how to make progress as you read the book. Share it with loved ones and/or your medical team. Buy the E-book or print edition of EMPOWER Yourself to Cope with a Medical Challenge. Face Your Medical Problems with Dignity.
Face Your Future with Optimism.
Fill your life with can-do statements and realities.
B'SD 28 Menachem Av, 5775 I hope that you'll find the scenario below worth waiting for. My week has been busy helping friends, working, and wearying under excessively high heat. I've needed lots of rest between errands. I experienced an insight that you might appreciate. I was caring for a friends' child as she met some conflicting schedule demands right after she'd moved to a new home. Boxes and bags of miscellaneous items were strewn across the floors, in easy reach of a curious two-year-old. Here's how things went:
Wednesday was Make a MESS Day as he proceeded to demonstrate that he can open anypkak aka bottle cap, including the ones on his bottle of formula plus his water bottle. He doused the contents everywhere before deftly reclosing the opened containers. We had a war of sorts as he protested my removal of his soaked clothing. Baby formula is so sticky that Doda Yochi (me, Aunt Yocheved) wanted to replace soaked clothing with fresh clean items after washing him clean.
Name the little boy who wants a bath. Get the picture?
We returned to the scene of the crime, boxes and bags galore outside the bathroom.
I tidied up the kitchen and realized that the baby was quiet. Too quiet. I turned around and found him headfirst inside a box. I peered inside.
His mood worsened when I took away the jar of liquid soap that he wanted to drink from!
It was purple.
It was shiny.
It made bubbles. And the cap had popped off just as I peeked in to see what was going on in there.
But I wiped the pretty goo off his lips and took away the bottle.
Same story on the tanning lotion, the skin softener, and each container of whatever liquid item the child could find. I was stacking boxes in a pile and dangerous contents on a table, out of childish reach.
Poor guy, he could not reason with me! Cute smiles, whimpers, even verbal requests for "Pkak, pkak. pkak!!!" made no difference. He could not reason with me, tease me nor con me out of my "No dangerous contents for you, fella" attitude. Even a hug and a kiss on my knees made no difference. I was one obstinate child minder. But, no matter. Lunchtime proved that we shared love. He fed me mashed hard boiled egg with minced cucumber and tomatoes during his meal. He ate a spoonful that I gave to him, then he dipped his hand in the bowl to smear the remaining contents on his palm. He fed me with his fingers, throughout the meal. He ate, I licked his hand, he ate, I kissed his fingers, and so it went. After each swallow I made he exclaimed "Did it!" He was so proud of me that he clapped with joy.
On Thursday we switched to "Aerobics Day!" He was determined to learn to climb the indoor staircase as his parents do - "Abba this. Ima!" ("Daddy does it, Mommy too") was the goal. So, I held him around his chest and prevented falls as we climbed up and down the stairs for over an hour. We took a break for snacks, and I washed his face and hands afterward despite the gratuitous grumbles that he offered. Then I set him on the floor. He pushed his hi-chair back, headed for the staircase and climbed 5 steps alone, unassisted. As if to demonstrate his prowess, he played with me on the colorful foam mat festooned with cartoon characters, imitating my push-ups and leg lifts as only a two-year old can; He fell on his tummy and giggled.
Anyway, the incident seems to present an example of how my protectiveness prevented falls, poisonings, and major messes, though the baby has no idea what motivates me to behave as I do. He grumbles on occasion, but loves me despite the hardships. He realizes that I keep him safe, fed, clothed, clean (albeit begrudgingly so) and very loved.
Think about it. That's how we go through life, wondering "What the heck?" when GOD intervenes in our lives. We have no clue as to what's behind the scenes aka on Her/His mind, to prevent damage to our souls or bodies. Somehow, we work past the problems we accuse GOD of causing to us (or not), then realize that we LUV Him/Her anyway as it dawns on us that somehow we were saved from a disaster we're not too sure about nor understand in retrospect.
Loving parents, grandparents and guardians, I'm sure that you can relate to the story above, and see yourselves in relationship to GOD with it. We're in GOD's role, so to speak, when it comes to child-minding. And that clues us in to our role as children of our Creator. Somehow it happens that though we pursue some goal or other, it seems that, at times, there is a conspiracy to prevent us from achieving it.
Illness, disability, the loss of loved ones, inner and outer pain, name the challenges. They hurt in agonizing ways. We have preferences not being met. And yet. And yet... Some things in life are so wonderful, reliable, and soothing. We can put life into perspective, focus on the richness, see the blessings despite the agonies, and go forward. Even if we need time to catch our breath or to rebuild our strength first, we can redirect our thoughts and perceptions in a pleasant, productive way.
What are your thoughts about that?
Buy the E-book or print edition of EMPOWER Yourself to Cope with a Medical Challenge. Face Your Medical Problems with Dignity.
Face Your Future with Optimism.
Fill your heart with wonder. Work on the project if necessary. It can sweeten your life.
The 44C/107F-plus weather in Israel has been brutally hot and physically plus mentally draining this week.
I was simply too tired with the rest of life and the high heat to post messages on this blog. But I had a moving experience yesterday that I want to share with you. I often volunteer my time, insights and efforts to help people or organizations in need of them. I tend to interact with people and situations involved in medical and/or emotional and mental health stress. One of the people I'd recently helped took me out for a cup of coffee in an outdoor cafe as the excessively high heat cooled down for the Middle East night. We spoke of the person's life history (I had not previously known it), attitude toward the future, and assessment of a highly problematic past. The conversation became charged with spiritual implications and realizations. I do Self-Help Coaching with clients who are uncertain of how to proceed with their futures because of their medical conditions. I help them to clarify their challenges, identify their goals and to create an agenda for achieving those goals. Then they're on their own, to make necessary efforts. The person before me had done this without my input. I found the courage, clear headedness and humility captivating (please notice that I'm intentionally avoiding pronouns such as "him" or "her" so I can protect the person's privacy). With further discussion, we agreed that such a mindset is due to one specific focus:
You're not searching for your life's meaning.
You're creating it.
So many people trek around the world, ingest (usually illegal and unsafe) substances or indulge in unproductive self-analysis as they seek emotional comfort. They remain stuck, not necessarily knowing why that's so. People who are "looking for themselves" tend be trying to escape their thinking processes and emotional tendencies, not in finding their true self and then making progress.
The solution to the problem is attitudinal.
Choose to make progress instead of swirling in the aftermath of unpleasant circumstances. Make incremental changes, one at a time. The person before me at the cafe had done so despite horrific betrayals and medical manipulation. I was awed at the result: A face glowing with self respect, a person making sensible choices, and a life going forward despite the bumps that tend to whack us mortals when we least expect them.
I then explained that
shows readers how to do much of that
with the cooperation of loved ones,
their medical professionals,
or all on their own. The book holds fill-in-the-blank lines that you and/or they can fill in together or individually.
I came away from the conversation happier for realizing that I'd made a choice to empower my readers. It's no simple matter to carry on with heartache, debts and illness that seem to impede many simple choices. Over time, some of those readers have contacted me to express their gratitude for the content. I pray that the book will help you to create some of your life's meaning. I salute you for your determination and your focus on a better tomorrow. Here's an insightful look at what you're accomplishing.
Buy the E-book or print edition of EMPOWER Yourself to Cope with a Medical Challenge. Face Your Medical Problems with Dignity.
Face Your Future with Optimism.
Fill your soul with spirituality, positive growth beyond your present limitations.
I'm mentally and emotionally preparing for the holiday of Shavuot, and thought of an interesting slice of life story to share with you. It happened the day before yesterday in the late afternoon/early evening. I was rushing to meet a friend giving me a ride to a distant city so I could run necessary errands there in a short span of time. Somehow I had not thought of taking my street map with me, and lost my way. Eventually I received a message on my cellphone. It indicated that the gentleman doing the driving would be leaving earlier than we'd planned. I needed to arrive to his office faster than I'd thought. I began to feel frustrated with myself, frantic at the thought of missing the ride (it would have led to several disappointed and inconvenienced people depending on me to arrive in a timely manner) and quite foolish. A friend tried to guide me via cellphone to the meeting point I sought, and managed to misdirect me into the opposite direction that I needed. We shared an uncomfortable silence as we realized that. I was unhappy in the 104-degree heat, tired of carrying a heavy bag, and desperate for a quick solution. My friend begged forgiveness for having misguided a very pressed-for-time me and then berated herself. I interrupted her self-flagellation by saying "Stop. I know what's going on I've been through this sort of situation before. Several things are going kerflooey in rapid succession, I have few to zero options and I need to stop what I'm doing to realize that GOD is controlling the situation. I'm not supposed to freak out. "I need to keep things in perspective. GOD is running the show. If I can manage to keep my mood in control, He'll pull some nifty trick out of His heavenly sleeves. Who knows? Maybe I'll win the lottery," I laughed. "I'm going to trust my instincts and head in the direction I believe I need. You did your best and I appreciate that." We ended our cellphone call, I walked a bit, then I hailed a taxi in the hope that I'd quickly meet the guy giving me a ride before he headed out of town. And I wondered "Which blessing is heading my way?" I entered the taxi and calmly told the driver where I needed to be and in a BIG hurry. He turned around and asked "Are you kidding? It's down the street."
We drove to the juncture I needed within a minute, as I realized that an essential street sign had been missing from its designated spot. No wonder I'd felt lost and confused. But as things turned out, I had been right where I needed to be. I laugh to think back to yesterday's mad dash to the meet-up, that I'd used a life lesson well instead of condemning myself or my friend, and realized that "I'm where I need to be, I just didn't know it." Life's full of such situations. They can help us to grow, or to appreciate the growth we've made. Growing past your limits is a spiritual activity. I'm sure that you have "I'm where I need to be, I just didn't know it," life lessons to heed, too. Enjoy the moments when you get things right. They're wonderful. If you wish, let me know the blessings that come your way. Happy Shavuot (it begins Saturday night). I call it the international bar and bat mitzva party of the Jewish People.
Buy the E-book or print edition of EMPOWER Yourself to Cope with a Medical Challenge. Face Your Medical Problems with Dignity.
Face Your Future with Optimism.
Fill your life with self-confidence, one step at a time.
It's been a while since I posted to this blog, and for good reason. I've been traveling, seeking a home in a different city, and interviewing for employment as I dodge missiles while fellow Israelis and I mind our own business and/or try to stay alive.
My emotions were at peak performance last week, when a misdiagnosed medical issue and the humorous resolution to the "problem" improved my mood.
Before you read further, remember what I write about in the book, mention in my public appearances, and believe with my whole heart:
1. YOU are your own best medical advocate.
2. Keep the door open to healing/coping possibilities. Don't slam it shut in GOD's face. If you refuse to try options that can possibly help you, then GOD has nothing to work with. You've shut off your own supply system, so to speak.
Okay, back to last week's adventure: I was distressed by a mysterious medical problem, knowing full well that I will likely spend the rest of my life healing from the devastating effects of a benign brain tumor called a Petroclival Tentorial Meningioma. It had blinded and almost killed me in 2004. Life-saving surgery was in 2005.
My healing efforts focus on alternative/natural healing techniques because the Western Medical World has held no promise for my improved health or vision.
I have been blessed with astonishing success these past nine years. My eyesight continues to improve (the prescription for my glasses was lowered for the umpteenth time in July 2014). My overall health and physical strength are remarkably better than that of many people my age - including that of people who've never endured a medical crisis.
But one aspect of my recovery seemed maddeningly difficult to achieve: Sensation in my face. The former tumor's effects and the surgery to remove it had harmed the nerves which control my facial movements plus the ability to sense pain, touch or movement. My face has felt numb for a long time. I've repeatedly fallen asleep as a dentist drills my teeth to create fillings!
So, when I consulted with my health fund's eye doctor about a swollen cheek and eyelids - let alone disturbed vision - last week, she asked if I had other symptoms. "Yes, my face is in so much pain I'm ready to cry," I responded. "The pain is worsening by the hour."
The doctor examined me. She could not find the source of the problem and suspected a dangerous reason for the rising pain. I was told to report to an emergency room if the pain grew severe. I followed the advice within a day. My emotions were high with fear, concern and curiosity: How could this be happening and what did it mean, medically speaking?
Friends and I chatted around the clock as we hoped for a pleasant ending to the adventure. They wanted to pray for GOD to heal me from some dread medical problem, but I asked them not to. "Just ask GOD to make me healthier than I am. We don't have a diagnosis yet, so let's not over-dramatize the situation." They reluctantly agreed to my request. We prayed for my improved health.
Meanwhile, medical specialists examined me over the next 48 hours. I let some friends know that two doctors out of a rather large, growing bunch of medical professionals, suspected a rather low-key explanation for the pain. "I'm with them," I insisted. I refused to believe that a dire diagnosis was ruling the day.
Tired of medical tests and of meeting so many medical people in a short amount of time, I began laughing as medical reports began piling up. All of them indicated excellent health and a breath-taking improvement in my ability to see. But the big, and growing bigger, medical team lacked a consensus on what had made my face and one set of eyelids swell, let alone cause astonishing pain. Two theories prevailed, but we eventually had a medical evidence tie-breaker: I was experiencing a sinus infection! Nothing more dangerous than that. WHEW!
The blessing, as all the doctors and I realized with gradual awareness, was the very pain in my face. I had almost fainted from it. Why? I have not felt sensation in my face for almost a decade. Suddenly I sensed the effects of sinus congestion/swelling. It's severity shocked me. THAT was a tipoff to the medical team that my facial nerves have recovered. My new task is to re-learn how to appreciate facial sensation such as touch, wind, temperature and more.
I am grateful for the blessing. I can feel pain. I can sense pleasure, too. And I am relieved to have lived the life lesson I teach: To keep the doors open to miraculous possibilities. Who knows how this medical adventure could have turned out?
What if I'd allowed people to pray for a miracle I didn't need?
Or what if I'd tiraded at GOD and blamed Him/Her for the ruckus?
What if I hadn't let GOD "do the driving" so to speak?
And what If I'd rued the pain instead of realizing the blessing that it is?
Read Psalm 140. It's quite an eye-opener.
Let the soothing begin. Look at life with calmer eyes and perspective.
