Entries Tagged 'Patience' ↓

cheerfulmonk. Creative Commons license.
 

Guess who’s having a new will made? We were supposed to sign last Monday, but the lawyer made a few mistakes in our last changes so we decided to take the time to make sure she put them in correctly. We’ll do the final signing next Monday.

There’s a lot more legal jargon in this one than in the one we had made 18 years ago, which meant we spent a lot more time going through it and making sure we understood it. The lawyer did add some useful details in our advance health directives, so on the whole we’re pleased with the final product.

It is hard to believe, though, that some of complexity isn’t aimed at giving job security to lawyers.

What about you? Have you ever struggled with legal documents, containing language such as

I direct that the representation by a guardian ad litem of the interests of persons unborn, unascertained, or legally incompetent to act in proceedings for the allowance of accounts hereunder be dispensed with to the extent permitted by law.

The interest of any beneficiary in any share or part of this Will, both as to principal and income, shall not be alienable, assignable, attachable, transferable nor paid by way of anticipation, nor in compliance with any order, assignment or covenant and shall not be applied to, or held liable for, any of their debts or obligations either in law or equity and shall not in any event pass to his, her or their assignee under any instrument or under any insolvency or bankruptcy law, and shall not be subject to the interference or control of creditors, spouses or others.

If so, did you need help in translating?

cheerfulmonk. Creative Commons license.

cheerfulmonk. Creative Commons license.

cheerfulmonk. Creative Commons license.

Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength, while loving someone deeply gives you courage.
—Lao-tzu

If in our daily life we can smile, if we can be peaceful and happy, not only we, but everyone will profit from it.
—Thich Nhat Hanh

Last week’s post, What I Learned From Losing Loved Ones, was a heavy piece, and my husband’s brother has recently been diagnosed with cancer. He’s dealing with chemotherapy as well as the after effects of an invasive (5 hours in surgery) biopsy. I can’t do much for him and his family except to let them know that they’re in our thoughts and prayers, but I can work on my own equanimity and courage.

As I mentioned last week, the thing that works best for me is connecting with other people, with life as a whole. And this doesn’t have to be anything big. It can be as simple as sharing pictures and/or being understanding when dealing with insurance matters.

Goddard Is Back!
Goddard, the dog in the photos, is the first thing that comes to mind. Tom, one of our local Animal Control officers, sent an e-mail to the volunteers in Friends of the Shelter. It was entitled Goddard is back! He reminded us that Goddard often has issues with other dogs, so be careful when we take him out. Goddard was adopted last year and was doing fine in his new home, but he’s a victim of the housing bubble…his owners had to give up their home and move into an apartment.

After Tom sent the e-mail, he received a slew of responses saying how affectionate Goddard is and how much the volunteers love working with him. So I found these three pictures I took last year and shared them. It was a simple gesture, but looking at the photos again warmed my heart, and the father of the girls in the pictures hadn’t seen them before. He wanted to add them to his collection. Of course.

Dealing With Insurance
Keeping track of health insurance matters is often a bit of a challenge, because it can take months for the paperwork to come back, and it’s often incorrect. Even the representatives don’t always understand the system. Sometimes a phone call will clear up the matter, sometimes it won’t. I had a case this past week where the representative said absolute hogwash. There was no way his story made sense. And that was all right.

I’ve finally learned to be patient and to remember my interaction with a fellow human being is more important than straightening things out in one phone call. One question that helps is “How can I connect with sacredness in this moment?” I cheerfully admit, it’s an off-beat approach, but it works for me. So in cases like this I thank the person for his time, then I make another phone call later to get more information. I keep trying until I find someone who understands what has happened and how things should work.

It took me a long time to view dealing with red tape as an opportunity to make this world a slightly more loving place. And doing my small part, no matter how modest, to do just that is the best way for me to handle stress and mourning.

What About You?

What are your greatest sources of stress? What are your greatest resources? What works for you?

 
This month the topic for Robert Hruzek’s group writing project is What I Learned From…Animals. That’s an easy one for me because my two granddogs, Sammy and Banshee, are my role models for blogging. They were taken aback by the size when we gave them two huge bones a couple of years ago, but then they dove right in, had a good time and never looked back.

 

I thought of them a lot the past two weeks as I made major modifications to my blogging theme. It was a big stretch for me, but I kept my granddogs’ lessons firmly in mind:

• Don’t be intimidated,
• Have a good time, and
• Hang in there.

As you can see, Banshee did a great job with that bone.

It’s been a great two weeks for me, too. I still have some fine tuning to do, but I finished the most important modifications. I also learned a lot…there’s a noticeable increase in my skill level. So thank you, Sammy and Banshee!

What about you? Do you have any role models? Have you tackled any challenges recently? Please share your ideas in the comments section.
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Thanks to bikehikebabe for commenting on last week’s post.

Elizabeth Thomsen. Creative Commons license.

If you do a Google search on mindful eating, you will find quite a few links. I recently did the search because I read a Wall Street Journal article entitled Putting an End to Mindless Munching. It’s an intriguing idea…many people who are overweight don’t enjoy their food…they’re often thinking about the next mouthful rather than savoring the present bite. I’ve noticed that I do that at times, and the easiest way for me is to slow down is to think of this delightful picture by the constant skeptic

the constant skeptic. All rights reserved by owner.

 
This picture tickles my funny bone and encourages me to wake up to the present moment. I mean, if a squirrel can do it, why can’t I?

So, that works for me. What about you? Do you savor your food or do you rush through it? What works for you? Please share your thoughts in the comments section.

Thanks to bikehikebabe, Robert and Tracy for commenting on last week’s post.

Thanks also to the constant skeptic for permission to use the picture.

Clairity. Creative Commons license.

Listening is a magnetic and strange thing, a creative force. The friends who listen to us are the ones we move toward. When we are listened to, it creates us, makes us unfold and expand.
—Anonymous
 
 
The greatest motivational act one person can do for another is to listen.
—Anonymous

This month the topic for Robert Hruzek’s group writing project is What I Learned From…Odd Jobs. Robert wants to hear about the strangest, most unusual job we’ve ever had. Since I’m a volunteer at heart, I’m not restricting myself to activities I’ve been paid for. I figure if it was something that required commitment for a reasonable length of time, it counts.

My most unusual job, then, was listening to an acquaintance for at least two hours a session, two or three times a week for several months. The woman in question was in her late 60s, had worked most of her life, and was facing retirement. It was time for her to move on, but she couldn’t imagine what she would do without work to structure her life. So she tackled the problem by talking through it. And when I say talking, that was it. She wanted no comments or other interruptions from me. My job was simply to listen the whole time.

MicheKerr. Creative Commons license.

If you’ve ever been in a situation like that, you know how hard it is to be just a listening post, with all of your own experience, thoughts and talents pushed aside. I sometimes felt I could easily have been replaced by a tape recorder or by a friendly pet.
 

How did I get into that situation?
I didn’t expect it to be like that. I assumed she would be thinking on her own and wanted someone to bounce ideas off of. That’s what works for me. I find changes are more fun when I try things and share the results with someone else. When I discovered she didn’t want that, I did try to make the interaction less mind-numbing for me. I actually brought a timer and suggested we take turns talking and listening. That idea lasted about ten minutes. Then she ignored the timer and kept talking.

Why Did I Continue?
So why didn’t I just call it quits? I asked myself that question more than once, and the answer was always: it felt like the right thing to do. The sessions were clearly doing her a lot of good, so I decided to keep going until she had made her transition. She wasn’t talking for the sake of talking, she was seriously working towards something. The process wasn’t going to go on forever. And, in fact, after several months she was started in her new life. She signed up for some courses at the local university and became involved in causes that she cared about.

What I Learned From the Experience
What did I learn? I learned how much I care about making a contribution, something to make this world a slightly friendlier, more loving place. I had always believed that one of the best ways to do that was to listen deeply to another person. But after this experience I learned that I have to pay attention to my own interests and talents, too. So I started looking for situations where I could be more than just a warm body, a listening post. I’m not at all sorry I had this experience, but I don’t feel obligated to ever do it again. Instead I’m living by my motto,

Find what you love to do and find a way to share it with others.

There are all sorts of ways of making a contribution. And there’s no rule that says you can’t have fun doing it.

What about you? What has been your most unusual job? Do you have an urge to make a contribution? If so, how do you go about it? Please share your thoughts and experience in the comments section.

Thanks to bikehikebabe for commenting on last week’s post.

This post is also part of Marcus Goodyear’s Lessons From Odd Jobs group writing project.

lady-bug. Creative Commons license.

dominocat. Creative Commons license.

Becoming mature means learning to accept what you cannot change, facing unresolved sorrows and learning to love life as it really happens, not as you would have it happen.
—Barbara Sher

I realize that humor isn’t for everyone. It’s only for people who want to have fun, enjoy life, and feel alive.
—Anne Wilson Schaef

There’s an old Sufi story about accepting imperfection:

Mulla Nasrudin decided to start a flower garden. He prepared the soil and planted the seeds of many beautiful flowers. But when they came up, his garden was filled not just with his chosen flowers but also overrun by dandelions.

He sought out advice from gardeners all over and tried every method known to get rid of them but to no avail. Finally he walked all the way to the capital to speak to the royal gardener at the sheik’s palace.

The wise old man had counseled many gardeners before and suggested a variety of remedies to expel the dandelions but Mulla had tried them all. They sat together in silence for some time and finally the gardener looked at Nasrudin and said, “Well, then I suggest you learn to love them.”

An Experiment in Loving the Weeds

Learning to love the weeds in our lives…that’s an idea worth playing with. The big challenge for me this week was working on income tax. So to get in the proper frame of mind I thought of my new role model and asked, “What would a dolphin do? How would he handle it?” Another way of asking this question is “How can I get this done and enjoy the process?” Once I looked at it this way, the answer was easy. I love puzzles such as such as Word Jumble and Sudoku, and parts of doing income tax isn’t that much different. It’s just figuring out what part of the tax code applies to us and where to put the information we’ve accumulated during the year.

That’s mostly a word-logic puzzle, so I did some warm-ups with Word Jumble…it seemed to activate the same part of the brain that I would be using. And it got me into the ideal problem-solving state: a curious mind in a relaxed body. I also cleared off the dining room table so I could spread out my papers and not have to fumble through them to find what I needed. And I allowed myself plenty of time so I could take a break as often as I wanted.

Results
On the whole the experiment worked well. I enjoyed it, and I didn’t get frustrated when I had to think for a while to figure something out. That meant the process probably went a lot faster than if I had been pushing to get it done.

The only downside was I got hooked by Word Jumble and spent more time playing with that than I had intended. But that’s a topic for next week’s blog! I think it went so well not just because I approached it with the right attitude, but also because I’ve been practicing that mindfulness…a curious but patient mind in a relaxed body… a lot this past year. All those hours working on my two blogs (this one and the one at Cheerful Monk) have really paid off.

So, can we enjoy the weeds in our lives? As we can see from the pictures above, dandelions can be beautiful if you stop to look at them rather than being upset because they’re “ruining” your garden. And I dare say, there are probably a lot more things in my life that I can enjoy if I just stop fighting them. So I suppose the stress-hardy thing to do is take Nasrudin’s attitude—by all means try to get what you want. But if that doesn’t work, do your best to love life just the way it is.

This site is presented as food for thought. Please share your views in the comments section.

Thanks to bikehikebabe for commenting on last week’s post.

Leo Reynolds. Creative Commons license.

 
I came across a delightful story about a dolphin this past week. Two pygmy whales, a mother and calf, were disoriented and stranded off a beach down in New Zealand. Rescuers had been trying to help, but the whales were getting more distraught, and the situation looked hopeless. Then Moko, a local dolphin, came in. She pushed herself between the humans and the whales and led the whales out to sea. In just a few minutes she accomplished what the humans had failed to do in about an hour and a half.

The story reminded me of a Calvin and Hobbes cartoon, where Hobbes the tiger says, “It makes you wonder why humans think they’re such big, screaming deals.” It also reminds me of an article, written by a dolphin trainer, I read years ago. He said he was just starting to train a new dolphin and brought over some fish to feed it. The dolphin was a quarter way around the pool and indicated the trainer should come over there to do the feeding. The trainer insisted…no, the dolphin had to come to him. So the dolphin good-naturedly did, and the trainer felt pleased and in control. Except that about a week later he suddenly noticed he was feeding the dolphin exactly where the dolphin had been that first day. There was no contest of wills. The dolphin had just patiently and subtly gotten his way. Even though the trainer didn’t use Hobbes’ exact words, you could tell from the article that he agreed with the sentiment. We humans do have an exalted opinion of ourselves. It would be more appropriate to lighten up and have a bit of humility.

My New Role Model
In What I Learned From Being Downsized I said I had learned:

• Be optimistic and have a sense of humor
• Always keep learning and growing
• Be patient and bide your time when it’s appropriate
• Generate new ideas and opportunities for yourself
• Enjoy the adventure of life and have friends to share it with

It seems to me that dolphins come by that naturally. So in the future if I start to get thrown by difficult people and situations, I’ll just ask myself, “How would a dolphin handle this?” Hopefully that will quickly get me back on track. Let’s face it, life is a lot easier and more fun if we have a bit of humility and a good sense of humor.

Please share your experience in the comments section.

Thanks to Robert and Jackie for commenting on last week’s post.

There are few things more wonderful than knowing where you want to go and being on the path to getting there.
–Earnie Larsen

As I said in 2007–A Year of Adventure, I want to continue becoming more stress-hardy. I had a good chance to practice this past week, trying to resolve an insurance issue. It has been going on for seven months now, and when I last tackled the issue weeks ago I had a partial success. By last Thursday I had given them enough time to do something, and it was time to give another nudge. That, of course, meant time-consuming interactions with automated voices asking for information, being put on hold for long periods, and dealing with agents who weren’t trained to deal with the problem in question. Patience with bureaucracy has never been my strong suit, so it was a great chance to devise a better method of dealing with it. And that was the key…focusing on my own performance rather than letting my mood depend on how this interaction turned out.

Mainly I wanted to avoid getting frustrated at the time I was wasting on the problem. Putting it more positively, I wanted to use that time wisely and to enjoy the process as much as possible. Once I framed the situation that way, finding a good strategy was easy.

So I got out the necessary paperwork, including my notes from previous transactions, and I used my speaker phone so I didn’t have to hold the receiver while waiting on hold. I also made myself a cup of tea and opened Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert. I’m reading about her stay in Italy, where she spends her time in self-indulgence. That’s not usually my thing, but it was a quick way to stop thinking in terms of efficiency. And for me giving up the idea of speed and efficiency is the only way to deal with bureaucracy.

Very simply, I turned the waiting time into a mini vacation, and I used the interaction with the agent as an exercise in being friendly but firm…she wasn’t able to handle it on her level so I patiently persuaded her to talk to someone higher up. That meant a lot more time on hold, but I may have gotten this particular problem resolved. I should know in a few more weeks.

Whether or not that happens this time around, it was a successful learning experience. The next time I need to negotiate a corporate or government maze, it will hopefully be easier for me to remember that it’s my decision whether or not I waste my time feeling frustrated. Next time I might spend the waiting time doing something productive instead of taking a mini vacation, but it’s important that I enjoy whatever I choose to do. Because that’s the most effective way I have of motivating myself…to enjoy the process.

What about you? Do you ever waste your time feeling frustrated? How do you motivate yourself to do things? Do you ever have conflicts between what you want to do and what you “should” do? Please share your thoughts and experience in the comments section.

Picture by Aggarwal_Gopal via Flickr. Creative Commons license.

Thanks to bikehikebabe for commenting on the last week’s post.

They are able to tolerate ambiguity, uncertainty, and imperfection. They have a long-range perspective, so they give themselves and others room to grow. They can afford to be resilient, flexible, and creative because they are centered in their values.
—#4, Traits of Stress-Hardy, Resilient People

In my last post I said I want to continue integrating the Traits of Stress-Hardy, Resilient People into my life. One way I’m going about it is finding visual metaphors for what I’m aiming for. I also use affirmations and mantras, but my mind is primarily visual, so that’s the most powerful way of influencing it. For instance, years ago when I was hooked on food, one of the images I used was of slender silver chains pulling me towards the refrigerator. It was liberating to mentally take a pair of scissors and cut those chains.

The pictures of the goose in Having the Sense That God Gave the Goose is a great metaphor for Trait #6:

They take responsibility for their mental programming, their emotions, and their actions. If they have ineffective ways of thinking and behaving, they evaluate them and make appropriate changes.

And the picture above will remind me to take the long-range perspective mentioned in Trait #4. Notice the expression on the boy’s face. He has a long way to go before he can hope to be as big and as skilled as the man teaching him. But he’s not discouraged. He’s focusing on the present moment, doing the technique as best he can. That’s me….I’m just a little kid following my path and enjoying the process. When I temporarily forget to do that, I’ll think of this picture and get back on track.

What about you? What are you aiming for? What techniques are you using? Do you know of any pictures that would make good metaphors for becoming more stress-hardy? Please share your thoughts and experience in the comments section.

Picture by MASA via Flickr. Used with permission from owner, who reserves all rights.

Thanks to Galba, Mary and bikehikebabe for commenting on the last week’s post.

Colleen Wainright, the communicatrix, is presently participating in a 30-day hypnotherapy experiment and describing it on her blog. Her therapist, Greg Beckett, is apparently using psychosynthesis to find her subpersonalities and help her to get them to work together as a team. But on Day 19 they created a subpersonality that isn’t interested in cooperating. It’s called “the Resistor” and is interested only in resisting everything she tries to do. So she’s doomed to fight it forever if she wants to accomplish anything.

Being a great believer in harmony and the development of personality myself, I find that fascinating. I used the term “created” instead of “uncovered” above because just before the session she had read a book called The War of Art by Steven Pressfield. As Colleen writes, “the chief slayer of creative output, according to Pressfield, is Resistance. It takes many shapes (procrastination is a favorite) but moves inexorably towards its chief goal,” frittering away your precious time. Colleen had come to the session “full of excitement over this great new guide and its mythic depiction of a wiggly idea. But Greg decided to do old Steven one better: he called resistance ‘The Resistor’ and, after putting me under, got it to talk a bit.”

So now Colleen believes the Resistor is an essential part of herself. Who knows, it may very well work for her. It’s just not my style of operating. When I find myself dragging my feet about doing something that part of me wants to do, I honor that resistance and try to understand it. It may be right or it may be wrong, but it’s trying to protect me. Maybe I’ve been working too hard and need a break. Maybe it’s afraid I’ll commit myself to something I will regret. Maybe I’m just facing some tasks that aren’t much fun. At any rate, it’s worth taking a bit of time to see what the underlying issue is and resolve it in the easiest way.

Am I creating my own version of Resistance? Of course, and that doesn’t make it any less useful. I’m after something different than Colleen. She seems to be after “achievements of magnificent fulfillment.” I just want to live my life deeply and share it with others. For me that means not fighting life and myself but enjoying the process. So when I have something to do and find myself dragging my feet, I ask myself “How can I get this done and enjoy the process?” Usually, in the fullness of time, it starts to work.

Photo: Memorial to the French resistance by Rhian vk. Creative Commons license.