...But Remember!

forgive... and forget..

     ...but remember!

am i losing my mind?  i just said to forget...  but now to remember as well?

yes.  giving forgiving...  and forgetting the emotion it brought up...  but always, always remembering the lesson learned...

i knowing that you are constantly attracting anything and everything you experience, you hold the title to responsibility for allowing this negative interaction into your existence...  and so it pushed you to a new perspective with which to view the world...  some lesson was learned (or at least you are now closer to the edge about to fall into the enlightenment of an idea)...  through the contrast of this experience, you have now expanded into a new beautiful shape and it cannot go backwards, you cannot stuff the exploding bomb back into the neat little casing...

and so you should remember where you were pushed...  how you acted and reacted...  and now how you forgave and forgot...  how you expanded, what you learned, how you now feel...

remember...  for the remembrance of the joy of forgiving will make it easier to hear your inspired connection call you softly away from those experiences again...  in this respect, remembering is a beautiful practice of allowing Source to move to you and through you...

Forgive... and Forget

we have all heard it from our elder and wiser ones... to forgive and to forget...  and just as we have generally tuned out their opinions on our music, our hairstyles and choices in friends, we also have kind of tossed this vital, peace-giving advice in the wastebasket.

but its worth reaching back in and un-crumpling the edges to take another read.

what seems just a few words to speak as easy advice to give is really a difficult and trying concept to receive, however.  forgiveness in our society feels more giving up or giving in than taking power and responsibility...  we are mostly taught or conditioned to feel that forgiveness is weakness and harboring negative emotions is powerful, which is almost as backwards as backwards can be.

remembering that our personal perspective is the only one we can control, forgiveness is taking back the reins of your life after a negative encounter.  without forgiveness, you are voluntarily relinquishing power to another, allowing their undesirable actions to dominate your thoughts, giving them an inordinate amount of presence in your energy...  and forgiveness calmly regains priorities like releasing a hot coal to fall swiftly into a well of cool water...

understanding that from our uniquely individual perspective that each person is really doing the best that they can with all that they have can really assist the process of forgiveness.  it is easier to forgive another when you begin to accept that you can almost never really understand their own unique view as you could agree that it would be virtually impossible for any other person to truly understand you and yours.  have you walked in their shoes through every one of their situations?  has your perspective expanded in the exact same shape and speed as theirs?  or is it possible that as different an orange from an elephant are you and every other person you have ever seen?

and so in comprehending that giving forgiving is not giving in or giving up but rather giving grace and accepting responsibility and letting go, with this knowledge you now have, it is easier now to find peace in yourself...  taking every opportunity to practice forgiving brings you closer and closer to that "hole in one" where you hardly think of the process of forgiveness and it purely, instinctively comes naturally and immediately to you...

and forgetting...  to release the past as just that...  an event forevermore gone to your touch... you cannot edit it, no changes, no fixing, no more...  so just release it...  you have forgiven and grasped back on to the reins of your part in this world, but at the same time it is imperative that you let go of the story...  sadly many can give forgiveness but cannot give up the image of the negative interaction...  and although they might have fixed their feelings on the original opponent, they transfix their gaze through broken glasses at others, using that oh so negative experience to justify new prejudices and injustices and lack of trusting and conspiracy theories-- "oh, the sky is falling!"

it does not do you any service to hold on to the feeling that whatever it was gave you.  if you can forgive, forget it happened in the sense that it will not skew the sunset you look forward for...


art - Infinity by Martin Graetz Photographie on deviantART

Snow...

...love, like a blanket of snow, softly floats down from the heavens to touch our lives, thawing as it whispers on to our warm bodies like tingly, unique reminders of how the love of our universe comes to us, comes through us; how just the simple warmth that we are born with can evolve our environment if we can just look skyward and allow the flakes to melt on our nose...



art - ::Snow:: by *Ginsui-rin

Money like air...

money is like air

your bank account is like your lungs

whenever panicked about a lack of air, you quickly take a breath

whenever there is no stress, you breathe in and out easily, effortlessly

try to feel the same way about money

don't despair because your bank account is small today... some people are shallow breathers, others have larger lungs

when athletes or musicians train to become better in their craft, they practice breathing to increase the capacity of their lungs

you can too

so just relax. when you're ready, you'll start taking deeper breaths and you will wonder why you scrambled around for so long stressing about when there is so so much "air" around you to take in!!!

Everything Is Personal...

everything is personal... and nothing is interpersonal.

conventionally, we tend to think that the interactions that we have with other people in this physical existence as having to do with the motives that one person has towards another. this, however, is fundamentally incorrect.

when i say that everything is personal, i mean that every action that any person takes part in is a direct result of their own feelings and emotions. primarily, it has nothing to do with the interpersonal relationship on which the action affects.

think of a recent interaction you had where you might have been considered the "victim." maybe someone you regarded as a friend made a comment or did something where you felt diminished or hurt. maybe you were attacked. you were betrayed.

in each situation, the "aggressor" was not taking your feelings into account before jumping into action. this you may agree with, but not for the right reasons. simply put, they only thought about the way they would feel before starting that interaction. even if they knew how you would react, they only ever cared about how they would feel.

this same principal works equally on positive interactions. when i say "i love you" because i know the feeling that it inspires, i know how the other person will feel when i say it, and i might like that i can affect how that other person feels... and so i care primarily that i will feel better by giving a good feeling to someone else. i don't give charity because it helps, i give charity because it makes me feel good to help.

don't let anyone fool you (or try to fool yourself): we all work on selfish motives. we only ever do anything in the attempt to fulfill our own basic needs.

now, it could be argued that when i deliberately start a fight, that i am affecting another person, maybe even deliberately so... and how could this not be an interpersonal motive?? true, there may be some ancillary or auxiliary effect, but primarily i was feeling inadequate, frustrated or disconnected... primarily, i had a personal motive to release anger...

and yet in a positive sense, even when i pause a moment in traffic to allow another motorist in my lane, this is the same principle. yes, there is an interpersonal effect that benefits another, but in my deepest intention, i allowed them in to raise my personal feeling, reveling in my magnanimous act; a smile washes my face even if the other did not appreciate it (which wouldn't matter to me anyways!)

the point i am trying to make is one that will serve your positive personal motives to feel better more of the time: when you find yourself the "victim" of a negative situation, try to judge the other person less harshly now, knowing that they are inherently not really trying to knock you down, but instead lift themselves up (even if it seems a bit misguided in their execution).

try to understand that their action was an attempt (in the greater sense) to feel better for themselves. which only creates one option for you: you must now rein in your control over your own emotions. you are better served trying to understand the other person, to let them "off the hook" more often, to receive the gift graciously, to smile at the compliment, to release the itch to scream when you are cut off in traffic... because its really, simply, always had nothing to do with you.

an additional benefit to this knowledge now is that after reading this, you might be a little bit more responsible of how you feel. maybe if you want to start a fight, you can sit back one more second and rethink if this is the best detour to a better feeling. could you find a better avenue to travel that won't send shock waves in a butterfly effect around your region?