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As a former ESL tutor, it was my job to help non-native English speakers make sense of this tricky second language. I work closely with words all day long, and it’s often a struggle for me, even though I’ve always spoken English.
Take growth and a growth, for example. Both are nouns. Both suggest an increase in size. But depending on how this language is used, it can mean very different things.
Let’s say, for example, I’ve spent the better part of my Sunday evening helping a friend pack up her apartment and stuff her stuff into a tiny, unlit storage facility half way across town by the last of the day’s natural light. Let’s also say I received this call for help barely 24 hours prior and had other things planned for my Sunday evening.
In one sense, we could say that helping my friend when she needed it could indicate real personal growth—given that I would have preferred to chill at home with a good book. We could also call it growth, providing my motivation was done out of a pure desire to help her without expecting anything in return.
On the other hand, we could say that if I only helped my friend out of a sense of keeping score for when I’d need a favor later, and out of an inflated what-would-you-do-without-me, I-always-save-your-ass judgment, then we could rightly call that a growth because it’s an overblown sense of ego on my part; it’s toxic and needs some serious examination. You could even say I might need to cut it out.
The line runs thin between these kinds of growth. Of course motivation plays a huge part in how we show up. A more clear-cut example of this would be demonstrated by one person intentionally cutting someone with a knife. If that person’s a surgeon whose intention is to heal, then that’s one thing. If that person’s intention is to wound, however, then that’s another story.
Yesterday, I went to my friend’s place in a spirit of selflessness and support. And yet when I woke up in the middle of the night with my back tight as a fist, I wasn’t feeling so generous. That’s where growth becomes a growth. When we look back over choices we’ve made and decide that we should have done things differently, that we gave too much of ourselves, or that other people owe us something for our suffering, it festers within us and and works to our disadvantage. It’s more useful and honest to accept that the choices we made were our own and to leave it there without blame or resentment.
We always have at our disposal the opportunity to re-view the past in ways that liberate rather than keep us clenched in bitterness, pain, and victimhood. It’s not about lying to ourselves or ignoring what happened. It’s more about choosing to accept our actions as our own, to be kinder all around, and to let go of the past, which, consequently, helps us live more fully in the present. Like any language, this kind of communication takes repeated practice to gain fluency.
Your call. What are you working with today, honey? Growth or a growth?
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Victims
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A basic principle of energy medicine is that our bodies are always talking to us. Our bodies are highly complex, divinely designed, and they want to support us in all that we do. So, today, why not pay attention to what it’s saying to you?
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If you work a five day week, odds are good that you’re looking forward to the weekend. And if that’s the case, you’ve probably got a clear line separating the work from the fun, right?
On the other hand, if you’re a workaholic or an overly accommodating employee, there’s a good chance you can’t stop yourself from taking on other people’s projects and going well beyond your job description. Granted, sometimes we will have to go the extra mile in order to get the results we seek. But setting healthy boundaries while we’re at it is always a good idea.
Six weeks ago, I got around to redeeming a week-long pass to a local yoga studio. The coupon had been stuck to my fridge for eighteen months and had begun to curl at the edges, it was so old. I’d had a passing interest in yoga and the whole mindful-peaceful-gentle aspects appealed to me. It’s not that I wasn’t already physically active—I’d mostly been a runner throughout my adult life—and I knew I was missing an important element in my wellness routine. I wasn’t in that room ten minutes before realizing that somewhere along the line I’d lost the ability to touch my toes in the seated position! There I was, straining forward, trying to get my fingertips in the vicinity of my ankles at least. Not cute. At all. Mirrors along every wall attested to that sad fact.
I. Was. Horrified. How had I become so damn stiff? WTF I asked myself. When I looked around my life, I saw that I’d been letting work permeate nearly every ‘free’ moment of my day. Time for meditation, relaxation, fun, and doing nothing had all but evaporated as I relegated them to the bottom of my lists and let my boundaries drop. I also noticed I’d been missing my family and close friends more because of all of my deadlines and ‘important’ projects. I was even starting to slide into a low-grade depression behind it all.
When we don’t set boundaries, honor our limits, and give our body-mind-spirit what it needs, we throw the rest of our lives into imbalance. This affects everything and everyone around us. And if we’re not careful, we can become rigid and inflexible in ways that aren’t so easy to remedy. So. Where are you needing to mark your endings and beginnings more clearly? Have you started to get stiff in the areas you’ve been neglecting? If so, do what they do in yoga: take a deep breath, pay attention, and embrace where you are in the moment. And be gentle as you bring more energy to those areas. Simply start from where you are.
One more thing: I’m proud to report I can happily touch my toes again, honey.