There will always be serendipitous moments

I have quit being surprised with serendipitous meetings with people in my life that support what I'm doing. Last week I was in Park City with Judi, who I was in China with. She has a home there and we went up to write some curriculum for a women's seminar we want to teach. While out shopping in the quaint little shops on Main Street we walked into a boot store. They are the one of a kind cowboy boots that cost a fortune made from all kinds of animal skins and were very beautiful.
As we entered the store a spunky blonde customer said, "you're too late ladies I already bought all the cute boots." We chuckled and exchanged greetings. She is Cindy from Cincinnati . As we started visiting we shared what our purpose was in park City. She was so excited for us because she is a  retired RN and had taught seminars for women with 2 other partners some years ago. We talked about things she taught and things we will teach. Numbers and email addresses were exchanged and we departed with a hug. I love how the universe just presents opportunities in life to support our dreams.

I think I have become the Chinese Dear Abbey, or I would call it Dear Ling Chi, which is the name my students gave me. I get about 3-4 messages a day from my students asking for advice or help with something. I have included a few of the messages and my responses, I may do this weekly so anyone can see how dear, and wonderful these young women are.

Dear  Joyce:

      How are you doing these days in America?I think it is cool!I am Cathy,do you remember me?I miss you very much!

       Maybe I impressed you as a quiet girl,i am silence,right? In fact,i am not a quiet girl,just due to i have poor spoken English,sometimes I can not express myself well in English or i do not know how to impress my feeling,my idea in English,yeah,so i just keep silence mostly in class time.

      Joyce,you know?i love you very much!you are kind,you communicated us with your true heart,you listened our idea carefully no matter good or bad they were!How wonderful !you like our common mom!please allow me call you mom here,"m-o-m!"

      Best wishes

Dear Cathy, I did not think of you as a quiet girl, more of a thoughtful girl. I was impressed with your comments in class and your ability to communicate with me and others. Your comments are kind and I appreciate your thoughts. I hope you will always feel free to express your thoughts openly. Joyce

Joyce.How are you?These days i was not happy and i missed you very much.Today is my mid-exam day.In the morning i took the English exam.In this exam I felt better.but in the afternoon,i took the java exam which is my major.i felt bad.I made up my mind to learn it from beginning although it may be very difficult,i must face up it bravely.

Yesterday,i called my parents and i called them every weekends.my mother asked me whether i had something hard in my study.i answered no.because i do not want them worry me.So i must study hard.But i always waste my time.i regretted very much,but i can not control myself and i hate myself like this!To improve this situation,i made plan each day,but i can not carry them out.i puzzled and confused.I think of the words you ever told me and tried myself to follow it,but i failed at last.i am not a good student,right?

Best wishes for you.love Helen

 

Dear Helen, 

, No you are not a bad student. The minute you label yourself as that you begin to believe it. If you are wasting time it is because you are having a hard time focusing on something you are not interested in. You might include in your daily plan to do something you like doing. I don't know what your hobbies are or what you are wasting your time on, but maybe it is something you really like to do. It would be good to include your parents in your feelings and thoughts. They love you and support you and want what is best for you I am sure. You might talk over with them what is happening with you. I wish I could help more but I encourage you to tell yourself you are a good student and you can and will carry out your plan. Your mind will believe what you tell it even if it does not feel true. Have a good day. Yours, Joyce

Afraid of my Light

I realized in my writing this morning the quote by Marianne Williamson is so true for me. It is my light that scares me. Every time I start to move forward with something I want to do that might be powerful or enlightening I get fearful and stop myself. I let others comments stop me as well, but for the most part it is my own self talk that stops me. In most of the work I have done life coaching I have worked with survivors of some kind of abuse. I saw a new pathway for me today, I need to teach myself and others how to survive ourselves! We are our own worst enemy, we create our own misery with the stories we make up in our heads about any given situation.I get caught up in how great I was in China and how can I possibly claim that same greatness here? Well I can, and so can everyone else. I have decided I don't have to be in China with a hungry audience to be great. Steve and I taught a seminar this weekend helping deal with loss, called "Back on Track". It was fun. Fun to teach together with my husband and fun to teach people who wanted the information we were giving them. I felt my light come forth as we taught and just as in Williamson's quote "as we let our own light shine we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same." I spoke with a participant during a break and she mentioned how she had been inspired to write for a paper and started pursuing it and people around her discouraged her from doing it. I spoke to her and was actually speaking to myself as well. I told her to listen to her inner self and if she felt light from her inspiration she should follow it. Yeah , I know I need to follow my own advice.

10/17/11

I am starting to feel like my feet are getting more grounded and I am in Arizona. I have spent the day with my daughter who is about to deliver a baby girl in 6 weeks. It has been fun to help her get her nursery prepared and get her one last outfit to wear before she delivers. I really need someone to keep me chained to the house and out of the stores because it is way too much fun to buy baby girl clothes. I went to a thrift store today and bought about 25 sleepers and outfits that look brand new for $30. It is just too hard to pass up a good deal. I was a sucker for deals in China and now I am a sucker for deals here.

I went for a bike ride around the neighborhood tonight with my husband and daughter and enjoyed just looking at all the beautiful homes and yards. It is so different from China. The homes I saw were out in the middle of fields and in caves, and cement buildings. I take for granted all the beautiful things there are right here in my back yard. We have it so good.

My brother called tonight and we talked. He asked me “ what is different about you since you went to china?” I said “Well, I look at things differently, I appreciate what I have more, I count my blessings, I see how entitled so many people are here and wish I could help them see how lucky they are. I also feel like I have more to offer the world and there is more for me to give than what I have been doing. I have things to write, and to teach that I didn’t realize I had until I went to China. I am more confident in myself.

I am growing by leaps and bounds

There's never a cap on what can be learned. I have always considered myself technically challenged and cried for help from my kids or friends when I pushed a wrong button on the computer or anything else technical. When I accepted the invitation or call to go to China I knew it would be a challenge because I was told we would have to do power point presentations. It scared me but it didn't stop me. Feeling inspired by the whole concept of teaching Young Women in China how to take a stand and have a voice has pushed me like a bull dozer . The hoops I have jumped through each day has taught me anything is possible if there is a purpose or inspiration.
The first hoop was writing a resume, and a paragraph BIO of myself. It's hard to do that when I haven't always seen myself as amazing or remarkable. The next hoop was figuring out how to fill out a VISA on the computer and downloading Chinese adobe. Next, was mailing my passport to Phoenix to the woman's home in charge of Global Interactions. I did not register or expedite it. She never received it. I learned this while I was on vacation in Colorado. I panicked for a few hours and let it go until I got home. I found a passport bureau in Tucson and drove down there and got a new one for a mere $207 in 2 days. The day after Iwent to Tucson I received my old one back in the mail.I had sent it to the wrong address.I have been through rigorous
facilitator training , computer classes with a friend and gotten a lot of help from friends doing power point presentations. Let me just say I was  technically challenged, I am not proficient at anything but I am growing by leaps and bounds. I now carry around a flash-drive in my purse. I have been up late at night for the past 2 weeks  on the computer, not chatting, shopping or listening to music, but writing teaching modules . I am hopeful , excited, and  joyful about my experience and know it will be a wonderful time. For all those who have helped me I thank you. On top of the technical things I have learned the importance of living in the present. There really is nothing else. I don't want to live in the past, and I have no control of the future. I have had so much to do daily that If I would look ahead I panicked. If I lived daily and stayed present I did it without breakdowns. I am sold on the concept the  present is all we have live it well. I leave tomorrow !!!

I AM GOING TO CHINA!!!

I was told “If you don’t write it down it can’t happen.” So, I wrote it down, in fact I wrote a lot of things down. I have become quite a prolific writer of my thoughts and dreams. I have a story I would like to tell………About 6 months ago I attended a seminar (my husband and I are seminar junkies). I didn’t really want to be at this seminar, in fact I sat on the back row as he sat on the front row. I was feeling pretty lousy about my life at the time. My last child was about to graduate from high school and I wasn’t quite sure what I was supposed to be doing now. My job as a stay home mom was ending . What’s next? What now? These were my thoughts. While attending the seminar the speaker asked us what we wanted out of life? What did I want? I had no idea. There wasn’t anything calling to me or that I felt passionate about. Being dead, or without purpose and vision is a good definition of where I was at.

                The assignment in the seminar was to write down three things we wanted and tape it to the wall in the room with our name on it.  The things I wrote are now forgotten , but I remember some of the others papers. There were things like; get my carpet cleaned, get a new car, take my whole family out to dinner, take a vacation. I can’t remember what I wrote because they were just words on a paper, they lacked interest and passion.

                At the completion of the 2 day seminar I felt a little more alive and awake. I came home and created a vision board for my present and future. I had things I wanted to happen in areas of my life like: my relationship with my husband and others, my spiritual growth, how I can use my talents to serve the world and who will help me with that, my health, wealth and who I want to be known as. I read it every day for about a week, then maybe once a week, and it slowed down a bit.

                The things I wrote are on 3x5 cards taped to the wall next to my bed. In the past 6 months I glance at it every morning while stretching, but never read all of the cards. I’m giving a little background here for the miracle that has taken place in my life.

                My girlfriend met me for breakfast last Saturday to share an opportunity she had just learned about.  She said there’s a woman who started a World Academy for Women in China and she created it to help teach women to take a stand for themselves in the word as leaders. The next thing that came out of her mouth was, “she needs instructors, do you want to go?” I was inspired to the point of tears about the things she was saying . I quickly responded with “yes I want to go.”

                We met with the founder of The World Academy For Women on Monday and 3 hours later and a few more tears I was committed to the project. I left her home electrified, energized and feeling more alive than I had  felt in months. Here’s a purpose, a cause and a need, something I had been looking for.

                Sleep has left me because I am so inspired, excited and joyful.  The miracle in all of this is on my vision board on a 3x5 card is a statement that I wrote 6 months ago saying: “I want to help women in other countries to be more powerful and find their gifts.” When I wrote that statement I had no idea how or when that would happen. I simply wrote it because I wanted it .

                That card will soon become a reality as I become an instructor for a 5 week course at the World Academy for Women in China on August 30, 2011.

                What I have found through all of  this , is the value of having a vision for something, a purpose and a hope. When inspiration is not expressed you have depression. I’m actually excited to add more to my board now because there’s truth to writing it down and bringing it to creation.

Who gets bored?

Bored? Who on earth gets bored, that is the craziest word. I have a family free week, now lets see how I can fill every minute up, not with meaningless stuff either. Not only do I have plenty to do but also I have things I want to do , like be creative, write a little and create something new.It is never-ending what needs done and I get overwhelmed . That seems to be my favorite word. I have so many options. I am thinking of all the what if's and the possibilities. I am scattered too if that isn't obvious. I always want to do whatever I can for my kids because I want the most and best for them . I probably have enabled them at times because I have tried to help them too much. So.... now that they will all be gone for a few days is it actually possible for me to focus on some things I want to do and get done? It is funny that cleaning the house is not on the list at all. I have a lot to clean but not my priority for some reason. I have piles of paper under my desk that need shredded but that is not on the list either , it just stares at me as I write. I remember years ago when my children were small there was a website called Flylady. I wonder if that is still around? I actually let her guide me through a few organization projects and I was able to focus and get things done . I should probably look her up again and get a little help slowing down my brain and taking things on one step at a time. I think I will read a book, take an hour or two and clean out one corner of my office,write a children's story, do something fun with my grandkids and visit an old friend. There, I have made my to do list and now that I wrote it down it has to get done.

Self Inquiry On The Beach

There's nothing quite like the beach to bring me back to myself. I'm not sure what it is but sitting on the beach and watching the waves break one after another gives my mind freedom to contemplate. As I sat there this weekend (in San Diego) I thought about things that are working and things that are not working in my life. I don't mean the car or the dishwasher. I mean the workings of my being, my existence. I have  always taught that when something bothers you about someone you probably have a similar characteristic inside of you that you don't like or the flip side of that behavior. Or another way to look at it is if you are pointing a finger at someone there are 3 more pointing back to you . I took a look this weekend at different people in my life that bug me. I saw the parts of me that are very similar. I don't like those parts of myself and like to push them down inside. I've decided if I want to awaken to new parts of myself I have to love and embrace all parts especially those I don't like. Now when I see those people I am bugged with I feel gratitude. Grateful for who they are and for the gift of seeing myself in them. Do I still get bugged? Maybe , but if so it is because I'm bugged at myself. I want to be more whole and complete. I can't do that if I am not looking at all of me. It's a lot easier to see the parts of ourselves we don't like when we are judging others. Try it this week. Look at the people you get annoyed with or judge (if you are a non judger  I applaud you). See what it is inside of you that has a similar behavior or the opposite of it. Learn to love an accept that part and let God do the judging. We are imperfect beings trying so hard to perfect ourselves. When we look at all of who we are the good the bad and the ugly and love it all I believe we become more whole. Sometimes that's easier said than done. What would make you more whole and complete?

Where Do I Turn For Peace and Help?

I went to visit a friend yesterday who is a very good person and does kind things for others. I noticed a new wooden plaque by her front door that said “This house is protected by Guardian Angels.” It made me smile and immediately I thought of angels around us and the angels in my life. The same day I heard a story of a 13 year old girl recovering from surgery having a tumor removed. When she awoke she named for her parents all the deceased relatives who were in the hospital room watching over her. She fell back asleep and upon waking told them again “all the children in this intensive care unit are being watched over by angels.” Later that evening I received an email from my daughter who is on a church mission in the Philippines. She mentioned in the letter “we can call on angels to help us, they are there waiting for us  and wanting to help.” I have certainly experienced times in my life when I needed peace or  guidance  or a boost in my moral and have called on angels. When I feel scared I ask angels to surround me and watch over  me . When my son was touring across the country with his rock band I often petitioned the Lord that angels be with him and protect him. There have been living angels that bring me joy and peace.

I was on a trip with my 18 year old daughter to Chicago back in 2001. We were sightseeing and returned for her  friend’s car and it had been towed. We called the number on the wall and got the address.I had my trusty city map and we started walking to the car impound lot as the sun was setting. The neighborhood we were in was very nice but started declining the further we walked. A city bus pulled up next to us and opened the doors. The driver said “where are you girls going?”. We told him and with disgust he shook his head and said “get on this bus, where are you from?” We visited with him and watched the scenery as we drove through the city projects. It looked like something we  had seen in  the movies. He stopped the bus and pointed across the street to the impound lot, that was fenced with barbed wire and barred windows. He said “you girls cross the street, don’t look at anyone, get your car , drive that direction and don’t look back.”   

We did as he told and I thanked God that night for a guardian angel. There are living angels that can help us and angels around us that we can’t see. This has given me time to reflect on those moments where angels have helped me.

 Who and where are your guardian angels? Do you call on them for help? What are your experiences with angels? Do you sense or feel them or do you see them?

Always a mother

I have told my kids "once a mother always a mother". I don't know how not to be one. I just keep finding people or things to mother. I was happy to meet a woman in a public bathroom today cleaning off the counter and when I looked at her she said " oh such a mother thing to do isn't it?" I laughed because I realize so many mothers out there will clean up wherever they are because that is what they are used to. I don't cut my husbands food on his plate but I do pick up his shoes and socks and clear his plate from the table.. I can't sit still if I see a mess somewhere and no one is doing it. I know it may sound a little codependent. Remember that word? That was a buzz word some years back and all of us mothers who were great caretakers found a new diagnosis for our neurosis. I have always wanted to be a mother and have always taken care of so many. When my mom became ill when I was 12 I immediately took on the role as her caregiver. It didn't end for a long time. She moved in with us after her stroke in 1999 and lived with us for nearly 5 years. It was a bittersweet experience. I will always be grateful for the things it taught me and my children. The kids even appreciated the ways they learned to serve. I became her parent in many ways and had to give back what she gave to me for half of my lifetime. I look at all the things I mother, the neighbors dog ( we are taking care of for 5 weeks), flowers in the garden and fresh cut, older people that look like they need a hand, my grandchildren,my neighbors who don't like to cook,any project that needs done I take it on like a mother. You know how we kiss a scraped knee when it is hurt, or put on a band aid when someone falls.  What kind of things do we take on thinking we could make it better or put a band aid on to lighten someones load?

This was graduation evening 2011

My first day as a blogger

There's wonderful blogs that are so entertaining and creative by these new technologically savvy moms. They have great pictures of their children (they're all budding professional photographers), taking pictures of feet, half a body, a hat, toes,and a nose. All those things that were thrown away when we developed pictures like that when my children were little. I got their 3,6,and 9 month old photos at kiddie camera in the mall or Olin mills. Either way, I am not a budding photography or a young mother. I am a mother, grandmother retired Life Coach and a budding writer. I need a place to vent and allow my thoughts to come out on print. I am almost an Empty Nester . Our youngest daughter just graduated and is moving on to college soon. I have felt a little lost and wondered where my role in life is now. Graduation was the most difficult.I kept thinking this is the last one of these I will go to of my own children. I called in for her on Senior ditch day and felt sad it was my last phone call to the school. When I received her last report card I cried too. I had all her friends over for graduation dinner and cried knowing that most likely they would not be in my living room or kitchen as a group ever again.It is a time of transition for me. I don't necessarily mind transition I know there is growth in it. I just usually avoid pain if possible.This has been painful. I will miss having the responsibility of raising , teaching, nurturing,and being the boss. Therefore, I will write about what I am experiencing in my transition.I have had many experiences in my lifetime that have been both painful and joyful and writing has been my greatest friend and therapy. I wonder what other mothers feel when their last child leaves home?