People and Memory

Today, I am so grateful for the ebb and flow of people in my life.  Sometimes, particularly when we are young, it seems as if the people in our lives will always be there, that this or that friend will be your BFF, and that while others may come and go, this one is permanent.  We also learn, as we grow up, that family members who seem as constant as the sea, are not necessarily.  Some of us are lucky enough to have parents into our own advanced age, and some lose parents unexpectedly young.  Each situation has its own happiness and heartache. 

When we have our parents into their (and our) advanced years, we are the witnesses to their physical and sometimes mental decline. But we have all the good times that we shared for so long, all the tender moments, and the opportunity to still feel like someone’s beloved child.  The people who were our guiding lights, who taught us the things we needed to know, or were even examples of how we did not want to behave, sometimes become a responsibility, sometimes even a burden. But the loss of parents, or even siblings at an early age, is a different kind of responsibility.  It entails keeping their light alive in us. We have the advantage of remembering them as they were, at the height of their health or beauty, but it reminds us that we lost out on creating more memories to take with us into the future.  It makes us enforce a mental stamina to not give in to overwhelming grief, and to appreciate the years and the days of happiness that we spent together.  Remembering is the scaffolding that helps us build on the foundation that was laid when we were together. To be overtaken by sadness is to surrender all the good times, all the laughter and the anticipation and the enjoyment that we had in each other’s company.

This week I had occasion to feel the sadness of loss, because we are celebration holidays that I have always been particularly fond of.  But I let that sadness be a signal to me to also remember the happy times, the closeness, the love that we shared, and the things that I learned from my loving parents and brother, of blessed memory. Feeling the sadness and their absence, I felt the empty place that they one filled.  Allowing myself to feel further, happy memories of the love and laughter filled that empty place and I felt gratitude. Appreciating how lucky I was to have had them for as long as I did, I felt gratitude that I can remember and enjoy the good times that lifted me up.

As a result of that loss, I have been lucky enough to reconnect with old friends, with members of my family that I had not seen in a very long time, and to take comfort from that renewal. There is present in every event, every day, every moment  both good and bad, happy and sad;  it depends on where we cast our eyes and let them rest that we decide what kind of life we are going to live.

The Renewals of Spring

There are many things that remind us that life renews itself, and if we are able to let it, it can be a renewal of our spirit, our feelings, and our attitudes.  Last night my family celebrated the holiday of Passover, with its attendant reminders of renewal, and also with reminders of the past. This week, my Christian friends will celebrate renewal with the Easter holiday, and last week, I attended a Nourouz celebration, Persian New Year, with all of its attendant symbols of renewal. My favorites are the customs of jumping over fire, to leave behind the bad things of the old year which cannot follow you, and the breaking of noodles into the traditional soup while making a wish for the year ahead. I am quite sure that other cultures celebrate the coming a spring, with its newness, its green-ness, the flowering of plants and the promise of the fruit to come. The celebrations of Spring are the celebrations of Life renewed.

Keeping in mind my philosophy of appreciative living, and that all things are present at all times, the good and the bad, the happy and the sad, and that what we choose to look at is what becomes our story, I was able to look around my table and not only note the absence of those I have loved who have now passed on, but also the smiling faces of those who I actively love and appreciate today and every day.  I was and am grateful for the love I felt all my life from my parents and brother, who are now departed. Yes, I miss them, but I choose to remember all the good times we shared and let that make me happy.

I was able to appreciate the other people that they were responsible for bringing into my life, my sister-in-law, and my niece, and now her boyfriend.

This season of renewal reminds me that there are things for which to be grateful all around, all we have to do is to see them.  So pull back the curtain, let in the light, see all that there is to be grateful for, and ENJOY.

Lighten the Load

Have you ever been in a place that made you tired before you even began?

It is so easy, on a day when we are pressed with all there is to do and to accomplish, to feel bogged down, under fire, or just plain worn out. But remembering the principles of Appreciative Living has helped me to a new place where no matter what is happening around me, I am able to find a thread of appreciation in myself that makes it all a bit better. So, when there is dinner to prepare, and the dog to feed, and thinking about the calls I have to make, and the work still waiting on my desk, my mind has begun, through my training and training others to live and think appreciatively, to automatically turn to the good fortune implied in all of those things.

When there is dinner to prepare, I feel lucky that there is food in the house, that it is fresh and nourishing, and that I have the good luck and blessing to be sharing it with my loving family.  My dog Lucy, who depends on me for all her needs, provides me with the unconditional and devoted love and loyalty that only a pet can provide.  I can tell her things that I can tell no other being on earth, and she will not judge me, or find me wanting in any way.  Her devotion to me is as sure as the day dawning. The calls I have to make, whether they are for business, or to check in with the people I love, add something immeasurable to my life.  I have found something that I love to do, and I am lucky enough to be able to teach it to others, so that I can hope that their lives are as enhanced as much as mine has become with the practice of living appreciatively. Keeping in touch with friends and relatives is not only something that was taught to me by my parents’ example, it is a sacred duty and a pleasure. And the work on my desk is the extension of my thinking, the expression of who and what I have become: a teacher, a person eager to share what is good in what I have learned.

In every circumstance, there is something to appreciate, and there is a way to find it and make it ours.  At adult gatherings, where there are children fidgeting; there are healthy, smiling, mischievous faces, eager for fun. When we witness an unfortunate circumstance or an accident, if we notice that there are people who are trying to help and provide comfort, there is something to appreciate. When we look back, or reflect on unhappiness, there is, if nothing else, something to be grateful for in the fact that it is behind us.  Even in the loss of a loved one, there is the time we have spent together, the love we have shared, the happiness we have been lucky enough to have partaken of that makes us grateful for the good, if only we can see it that way.