Have you ever thrown a rock into a pool of water and watched the ripples run along the surface? The wave goes on and on for some time. It’s mesmerizing. Even after we are no longer able to see these ripples they are still traveling through the water, sometimes all the way to the other shoreline.
The same is true when we throw something through the air, the molecules in the air move and the ripple continues on, possibly to infinity. I believe our words have the same effect. They travel through so many.
This ripple effect is a powerful occurrence, and in the context of this blog it means that any action or inaction that we take has an effect on the things going on in our lives, and the lives of those around us.
When I was studying mediation I was taught that everything we do has a ripple effect on all the things around us. They can be positive or they can be negative. We must decide how we want the ripples to influence others.
Just contemplating our actions or in-actions before we move forward can influence our behavior to do better, be better and to help others or to be mean, hateful and hurtful.
Right how in this time we are having so many hateful words thrown out into the world from one person to the next. Hateful acts of violence in the name of what? Bodily harm done to so many that is influenced by the haters cheering this behavior on in others.
Beauty is all around us.
Have you ever had someone say or do something terrible to you? Think about that ripple effect that might have occurred. You probably felt hurt. You might have treated someone else badly, and then went home to your family and treated them badly. All because someone did something to you.
Can you see the ripple effect in your life when you think of your actions in any given moment? Did your actions make someone cry, feel hurt, or did they leave a smile on their face, perhaps a little hope in their heart? We each have that kind of power to hurt or help. How we choose to use it falls on us. Take a look at the world and see all the horrible ripples running through right now. We must change the course of the hate racing through this great country. We must be an example of what we expect of others.
I forgive all those who are caught up in the chaos. There is much that has happened on both sides of that story. Our feelings, and the feelings of others are so contagious. I ask that each of us stops for a moment and ask ourselves what we are projecting out into the world around us.
Sadly our children are seeing this chaos and reacting in a bad way as well. We must show them that forgiveness is a good thing, caring for another human being shows our humanity, and helping others is not a bad virtue, but a high goal to reach toward.
I say open the window in your heart and let the fresh air in. Let the past be past. Reach for a brighter day. Help the children let go of their fear, a fear that I am sure is consuming their little hearts as they see the adults in their lives going crazy. Assure them that all will be well. Tell them it was just a moment of insanity for this great world we live in.
Together we have the power.
Each of us can make it a better day for those around us by being kind. By being respectful. By demonstrating the kind of treatment that we hope to receive from those around us. We have the power to make this country a better place. We have the power to be a better human being. It just takes one person, just like that one drop of water to begin creating an ocean. And as I always say have a great day today. You and I deserve it.
I screamed at my bird this evening. He was out on his perch playing like he does most evenings, and I lost it. Coco is an African grey parrot who likes to imitate the beeping of my alarm clock, my cell phone, and even the microwave. He has a whole array of noises he likes to share whenever I’m trying to sleep or take a nap and he thinks I should be up. Well, there I lay sprawled on the couch trying to get some shut eye and that bird was filling the silence with his whole vocabulary. Did I mention that he also talks, but not as much as he likes to make sounds. I will reveal his less polite sounds like burping and farting, noises that sound just like my granddaughters, the little pigs.
I’m not sure if you know that I usually work nights which is probably the worst shift to work for any human being wanting to get a good night’s sleep. I’m one of those people that can only nap for about 3 hours. My body won’t let me sleep any longer even with a little medicinal help. I wake up and then take a two-hour nap before I leave for work. Giving me a grand total of five hours of sleep a day that is usually split up. Do I need to admit that sometimes I am a GROUCH. Understandable, right.
I also have a very ailing old dog and I’m goanna admit that sometimes my patience runs thin with her needs as well. And I don’t know what was wrong with me today but for sure I yelled at the bird, yelled at the dog, got up angry for being disturbed then yelled “Oh my God can I have some peace and quiet” and then I realized what I was doing.
How can we expect anything to be other than what it is? Why would I expect my talkative bird to be quiet when I’m sleeping during the day, and it’s his wake time. It’s cruel to try to get my dog to not bother me when I’m lying around trying to nap. She needs love, affection, food, and potty breaks. I felt like such a meanie.
She loved to wrestle with the baby.
Imagine how people must feel in the human world when others around them expects them to be something other than what they are. The song about rose colored glasses is really true because until we take those glasses off, we don’t see clearly. We may not realize who or what that person is before us in our relationship until we remove the glasses. Our expectations of who they should be often outshines who they actually are, and eventually if that is the case, we become disappointed, grumpy, and annoyed, which is crazy, a bird is a bird right!
If you are having relationship problems, I want you to stop and look at that person. I want you to see who you” think” that person should be. Are you seeing the real person or the one you imagine they should be? Ask yourself is this a clear picture of this person or am I just putting my desires of what I need onto their shoulders. I believe this is what happens in many relationships. We expect the other person that we share our life with to be different than who they are. We see those rose-colored glasses come on and love gets in the way as our heart fills with joy, blinding us like a ray of sunshine. But, when the clouds come overhead, and we get a good look and we realize we might have imagined these elements of who they are we start picking, and picking, and picking.
I was married to my second husband for thirty something years. We are still friends. He is the same person he always was. And I can tell you that when we first got together, I had some heavily tinted glasses on. Along the way as I grew up and grew older, I realized that just because I had expectations of who this person was supposed to be, did not make it so. That was a very enlightening “ aha” moment because we were going through some serious storms in our relationship.
It takes time to really get to know someone, be it friends or sweethearts. The main reason is we usually put our best foot forward trying to impress and win over that special person we want in our life. Eventually though the glasses come off and we see what we see, and that may not be a good thing for anyone.
They have to come off sometime.
But here’s where I come to my ex-husband’s defense and say that he was being 100% of who he was with all his little flaws, all his little kindnesses, all his bias ideas, and I was not going to change any of that by throwing a tantrum or pulling out the silence card or withdrawing from him because he was who he was and he didn’t understand why I didn’t understand him. He was just being himself. A bird is a bird!
Eventually I came to understand that we cannot expect other people to change to please us. If there is a change in a relationship it must come through a change in ourselves. We have to change our expectations and make them real. We must open our eyes and be fair to that other person.
Our marriage didn’t work out as the differences were too difficult, but I did learn to accept him for who he was, and we are still friends. I have my flaws, he has his flaws, and we care about each other. I came to realize how unjust I was being by expecting anything else.
Now I’m not saying that things can’t change in a relationship, but it has to be something you both agree on. Things can’t change if one partner is saying “ it has to be my way” or saying “if only you would do it this way, if only you were that way, if only you were more thoughtful, if only you were neater or kinder or cleaner or happier” or whatever it is that we are trying to lay on their shoulders that we think would make us a happier person, and that’s wrong.
Ta Da.
All we can do is learn to change ourselves to find peace within. To accept others for who they are and accept ourselves or if we don’t like what we see improve what we find wrong within in ourselves, not criticize the other person.
They say when you look at other people in your life you are seeing reflections of yourself. I tell myself that often if I’m struggling or being too judgmental. I say that is me looking back at me and that is what I need to take care of, perhaps what I need to change in myself.
If you believe in the ripple effect, I wrote a piece about that, you might get lucky and that other person may change a little bit too, but it won’t be because they see that we think there is something wrong, if may be because we have become a better person to be around therefore they are able to relax into who they are and enjoy our company, hopefully we can enjoy their company too.
Yelling at my bird didn’t solve a single thing. If birds could think, and I don’t know if they do, he probably thought I was crazy. I think his little birdie brain was saying “Doesn’t she know I always do this when I’m out and about. What’s wrong with her, why’s she’s so grumpy today.” Okay that was too much dialogue for a bird, but I will admit that I felt ashamed of my reaction to both of my lovely pets. I was upset with my bird for being a bird, and my dog for being dog. Please don’t be angry at those in your life be it people or pets for being who are. Be angry with yourself because you have the wrong expectations leading you astray, and it’s causing conflict in that relationship. The fix is for us to change our outlook, our reactions to life so that we can be a happier people. And may that happiness reflect outward, and hopefully others will find joy being with us. So, as I always say, have a great day today, you and I deserve it!
Hello, this is Kris, welcome to my blog cast, this is part two of my rant on breast cancer awareness month.
Sometimes the monster starts as a little tiny bump, a lump or scratch. Sometimes it catches our eye right away, and at other times it goes unnoticed for days, weeks or months. But once that creature has caught our attention we are very aware from then on that there is something abnormally wrong inside our bodies, be it small or large. It could even be some funky lab results. Whatever!
If you have paid attention to Yahoo or any of the other news networks there have been a plethora of stories telling about doctors who missed the boat and misdiagnosed patients for months, even years as they slowly died or almost died from cancer.
I cannot tell you the number of people that I have personally known, because the list has gotten very long, that have had something abnormally wrong in their bodies and were told to watch and wait.
Some days I just want to scream when I hear the stories of women and men who have been told “ let’s watch it” and then were later diagnosed with cancer. Young mothers told they were “just tired.” Young men who were scoffed at and told to come back in a few months. The list goes on and on.
What is it?
I had a lump in my breast. I noticed it one time when I was showering, isn’t that the story we always hear, it’s true. And I did what anyone else would do, I watched it for a few months. Did I mention that the lump was tender, it was, so I assumed I had hurt myself helping my son move.
The first thing my doctor said was that I needed to have a mammogram as the lump shouldn’t be there as if I didn’t already know that. I had the test which showed a small lump in my right breast. I followed recommendation after recommendation after recommendation for almost two years. I had ultrasounds, mammograms, saw a surgeon who told me it was nothing “it’s too tiny to even bother with.” I saw a breast specialist in Kansas City at a great cancer treatment center which I was so excited about because that is the place to go, “right?” the specialty place. That’s where they will get things right!
Let me just say I was dumbfounded when she told me it was “nothing, nothing” and treated me as if I was a great bother to her. She informed me when I mentioned that my lump was tender that “breast cancer isn’t tender, it isn’t tender, that is why we teach self-breast exams, it isn’t tender.” Well God Dam it, mine was tender and stayed tender until they cut the bastard out. Excuse my language.
Are you nuts, don’t wait.
Sadly, this specialist treated me like I was a complete idiot bothering her with this tiny lump. She told me to go ahead and quit my job of 21 years with good health insurance to go to school and have horrible health insurance which is exactly what I did as I heard her voice saying, “it is nothing, nothing.” She even stated that if it was her that she would do just go to school. Now I will share that she said, and I swear this is true, “I can go in and traumatize your body, but if it was me, I wouldn’t bother.”
Can I ask who out there would say, “oh, okay, yeah, traumatize my body.” My reaction was hell no I don’t want you to traumatize my body if there is no reason. I just want to go to school. I just want to get my nursing degree, and in my second full semester I also got to do chemotherapy which almost killed me, and radiation. What a success story! And what hell those months were for myself and my son.
So, the theme for today’s blog is that if you have something wrong in your body rather it’s a lump in your breast, in your testicle, in your neck, under your armpits or in your groin have it checked out, please.
If your doctor says let’s watch it, that’s OK. It’s OK to wait a little bit and see what happens, but my push for you is that you strongly encourage your doctor to run tests and find out what this abnormal foreign body is inside of you.
You could end up here.
It could just be a fatty cyst, but a fatty cyst can grow and attach to the muscle causing you problems. If it’s just a swollen lymph node watch it and figure out why the hell it’s swollen because our lymph nodes shouldn’t be swollen. If it’s your blood work and your labs are abnormal go back for your rechecks. Don’t wait!
I must admit as a nurse I know patients who do not return for their follow ups like they are told, and honestly doctors are too damn busy to chase you down.
My book is about taking action, doing something now, don’t just watch and wait and wait and wait. Almost two years after I found that lump, I finally found out what it was. Need I say I was so furious. This lump that had been so small in the beginning had grown because I did as they said and “watched and waited.” By watching and waiting it had grown, moved out of the duct into the breast tissue resulting in me suffering through chemotherapy and radiation in my second and third semesters of school.
There is more to the story that I will cover through the month of October, or you can read my book that is for sale on Amazon. The most important thing for you to understand is to take action sooner rather than later so that you don’t have to fight the monster in your body.
Let’s start a new mantra this year, and for all the years to come. Let us shout it from the rooftops, TAKE ACTION NOW against any cancer so that you will live another day and not have to fight the demon that may be hiding out in your body. And as I always say, have a great day today, you and I deserve it..
I am re-releasing this blog because ” Breast Cancer Awareness Month” is right ahead of us, just, one more day , and our minds will get blown away with all the “caring, sensitive, advertisements for products supporting breast cancer awareness. If you have read my previous blogs you know this is a sore spot for me. Below is my book which expresses those painful, angry opinions. They come from my experiences with breast cancer.
I will add a piece each week about my opinions and experiences with breast cancer. I hope my book will be an awaking for you. If I tell you one thing, it is to take action now if you have something that is wrong inside your body. Do not wait! Waiting can and will lead to death. Here’s the actual piece from Facebook.!
Okay, I have been thinking. A dangerous thing for me to do, but I must. I want to send out a challenge to all my friends, and friends of friends to share the new ” Take Action Now.” theme. Did you know that cancer kills, but did you know that sometimes cancer kills because we didn’t act fast enough.” My book, ” Screw Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Take Action Now. The New Mantra.” is an important message for all to hear. When something is wrong in our bodies we need to act. I would like to have this message reach a million people. I know, I know, I expect a lot, but the projections for the number of new cases of cancer for 2020 was roughly 1,805,695. I am talking just in 2020, with an estimated 606,800 deaths that year. The driving force behind my book is that I feel I am not reaching enough people with this important message of ” take action now” through just my blog. So if you will share this blog, and this post with all your friends on Facebook, and have your friends share it, and continue on to who knows when, maybe as a group we will save someone’s life. There is much to learn about cancer. It is better to learn it now instead of when you really might need to have this information http://www.amazon.com/dp/BO8GFCX7MK
Add as I always say, have a great day today, you and I deserve it!
Hello, this is Kris. Welcome to my blog. It has been quite a while and I must apologize. There are no excuses, only things that got in my way or distracted me from talking with you.
Sadly, I lost my sister recently. Her death came quickly, we only had two months to prepare, but considering her condition of health, and the cancer that was devouring her, I can only say she’s in a better place. If they let her in that is (that was her kind of humor.) When the hospice place first rejected her, she said, “it’s because my foot’s not far enough in the hole” and actually at that moment she was correct. Six weeks later she was gone.
I brought some of her little belonging’s home with me and throughout my house are little reminders of her. We lived quite a distance apart, over 1000 miles, but we saw each other almost every year so we stayed close and had many adventures.
I was the one who had to go through all her belongings and clear out her home to prepare her estate or should I say to prepare her mobile home to be sold. She had lots of little special collections that she loved and had gathered to herself over the years. Pretty little things that brought her happy memories. Collections of stuff that didn’t mean much to me or her friend but were special to her. Some of those little bits and pieces I brought home not because I wanted them but because they were part of her happy memories.
Most of her things went to charity which broke her and my heart. She couldn’t believe that all her cherished mementos meant so little to others. I did not have the time to stay around to find a good home for them. Sadly, out the door they went.
After her passing I was suddenly hit with the realization that I am the last of my family. Of course, my parents are gone, I’m 72, but now so are my siblings. I am the last of the litter. That is a scary feeling and brings home the age factor to me. As I told my son, I’m no spring chicken. Now I must admit it.
Something that I came to recognize as I put my grubby mitts in her cupboards and drawers is that sometimes we develop preconceived ideas about others. We look at people, form impressions of them by what we think we see, and sometimes miss out on who that person really is. What we think we know about people is a one-sided notion and the impressions may not even match who that person is before us. It is like looking at a flat piece of paper. We only see one side. We don’t see the whole book. We don’t see all the pages.
I believe we are influenced by our life experiences, who we love, how we love, and how we grew up and formed our personality. There are so many sides to our stories, but people only see one side, the side we want them to see, not the other pages and layers. We are one dimensional in our inclusion or exclusion of others. I can honestly say that I don’t think we know most of our family and friends as well as we think.
When we look at a stranger, let’s just say someone we think is well off and doing fabulously because they may have everything we desire in our life. We may feel envy or anger at their advantages. We may be jealous of their good looks, their obvious good luck, but what I want to say is that what we see of each other is only the outer shell of who we are. We do not see the inner self, the things that have occurred in that person’s life, the things that may have been done to them or all the people who have been a part of that life unless they have shared that story.
We can look at a person and assume by the way they behave and the way they are dressed or how they live if they have been lucky in life. We can assume through appearances that they have probably never been mistreated, but instead given all the luxuries of life. But what we may not know is if they have been depressed, suicidal, or abused because we really don’t know what is encased in that shell. The life events that have meddled and meshed to form who they have become. We are so much more than what is seen by others, we are not just the things around us.
Regarding myself, I keep secrets. I don’t always tell the truth when others ask how I am. I don’t let people see what has come before. And, I have very few in my life who know “my” whole story.
What I wanted to bring to your attention, and what has come to mine, is that we don’t know all the bits and pieces that are there when we look at someone. They may have a wealth of money, and a lovely home and car, but their life could be the shits for them. Maybe they grew up with terrible parents. Maybe they had a terrible childhood. Maybe their school years were terrible, or they were bullied. One thing is for sure, they survived all of that to become who we see before us.
When we look at you at each other we really don’t know what is there and I suggest we pause and analyze what we see when we start to judge others. That person we see is the bits and pieces of all their life events, and all their reactions and feelings to those life events.
I know that as I sit here, I’m surrounded with all the stuff I thought I wanted and needed, but as it turns out it is just a multitude of useless items that should I die in this moment nobody would want. When I was going through my sister’s belongings it broke my heart to see all the things that she had saved and collected, pictures she had and things that honestly meant nothing to me. Things that mean nothing to the one son that has survived her.
What I discovered is we don’t need all this stuff around us. I certainly don’t need all this junk I have collected over time. And after being at my sister’s I’m going to clear out the cupboards in my house because I do not want my children to have to go through the things that they could care less about or want as part of the death process when I pass.
I can honestly say that the real things that are the most important and will be the most important to each one of us is the time we have spent together. The laughter we may have shared, the pranks and jokes we’ve told, not the stuff that sits around and fills our empty corners.
If I was going to offer one bit of advice, and I am, it is that it is our connection with people, with our family that is the most important aspect of our life. We need to focus on creating happy, wonderful memories with each other, not buying another trinket or doda that will just be thrown in the trash when we turn to dust.
I’m not a wizard, brainiac, therapist, or anybody who has the right to tell you what to do, I’ve just lived 72 years of life experiences, and come to realize that I need to stand quietly and observe and appreciate my network of friends and loved ones more than all the things that surround me.
We’ve all heard the line “tomorrow’s another day” but I say stay in this moment, be present now, be present with the people today that are in your life and let them know through your actions and words how much you appreciate them, how much you love them. At the end it is not the stuff, but the people we will miss the most. And as I always say, have a great day today, you and I deserve it.
