The entire blog is titled Keeping it Simple – a mere lifetime of trying to do so! Having been addicted to difficult for so many years, I can now add obstinate and frustrating to those who can see such potential in me. To add to the mix, I am an ideas person who just needs an army to carry out the necessary plans. Trouble is, I don’t follow through. This blog is to prove I can. Whew!
Keeping in simple means stop making mountains out of molehills. Yes – that’s it. I know from working with women for so many years, it’s part of our imprints. Of course I generalise but I have to start somewhere. There are many examples of male/female ‘discussions’. Mine would go like so……..the male of the species would talk about what just happened. I would enter the debate and say….by the way, in 1988 you said such and such! How can a person deal with that? Am I being sexist – ask honest women: HONEST WOMEN. They’ll tell you. The very best example of keeping it simple is the Serenity Prayer. To encapsulate this brilliant piece of prose is thus: If you can do something about it, do it, if you can’t, let it go. Easy to say. John – you’ll hear a lot about him- can do that. I just say it, then think about the situation, trying to find other ways until I am exhausted. He is fine, thank you very much.
Keeping it simple. Current phrases like GET OVER YOURSELF helps. Living one day at a time, is another. In some circumstances one minute at a time is just about all one can manage. Let me tell you about one of my passions – my work with bereavement. Mourners have to learn to live with the seesaw of emotions. Smiling one minute, broken- hearted the next. Understanding there is no such thing as total happiness, that it is ephemeral, allows them to maintain their sanity. Keeping it simple. One minute. Up and down – roller coaster.
Add to mourners, the worriers. What can anyone achieve through worry? An ulcer perhaps. Again, being concerned is different from worrying. Not just semantics either. Worrying means one is trying to change the unchangeable. Concern is looking at what can be done and truly accepting if there is no solution. Is this easy? Absolutely not. In the way we were trained to worry and look at life’s difficulties, we have to untrain our brains and souls to deal with reality.
Shakespeare said ‘This above all to thine own self be true”. We were also conditioned to believe that encouraging our own skills and talents, being healthy and liking who we are, is selfish. SELF-ISH. Ish means of, so the whole work simply (doncha just love it) merely means of the self.
In the coming weeks, I will be writing about Women in Focus, Using Humour as a Healing Process, Eccentricity and Outrageousness – all fun stuff. Hope to hear from you
