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.