borrowed from Daily om, excellent thoughts

Your Perfect Teacher
Life

All the situations in our lives, from the insignificant to the major, teach us exactly what we need to be learning.

Many of us long to find a spiritual teacher or guru. We may feel unsure of how to practice our spirituality without one, or we may long for someone who has attained a higher level of insight to lead the way for us. Some of us have been looking for years to no avail and feel frustrated and even lost. The good news is that the greatest teacher you could ever want is always with you—that is your life. 

The people and situations we encounter every day have much to teach us when we are open to receiving their wisdom. Often we don’t recognize our teachers because they may not look or act like our idea of a guru, yet they may embody great wisdom. In addition, some people teach us by showing us what we don’t want to do. All the situations in our lives, from the insignificant to the major, conspire to teach us exactly what we need to be learning at any given time. Patience, compassion, perseverance, honesty, letting go—all these are covered in the classroom of the teacher that is your life.

We can help ourselves to remember this perfect teacher each day with a few simple words. Each morning we might find a moment to say, “I acknowledge and honor the teacher that is my life. May I be wise enough to recognize the teachers and lessons that I encounter today, and may I be open to receiving their wisdom.” We might also take some time each day to consider what our lives are trying to teach us at this time. A difficult phase in your relationship with your child may be teaching you to let go. The homeless person you see every day may be showing you the boundaries of your compassion and generosity. A spate of lost items may be asking you to be more present to physical reality. Trust your intuition on the nature of the lesson at hand, work at your own pace, and ask as many questions as you want. Your life has all the answers. 

This is a contribution by Kelly Reynolds

“Love does not obey our expectations; it obeys our intentions.” ~Lloyd Strom

To say that love hasn’t obeyed my expectations would be the understatement of the century.

I have not been lucky in love. I’ve been blessed with some amazing moments over the years, but somehow have managed to choose partners who did not want what I wanted, did not feel what I felt, and did not want to walk beside me into a future together.

I have really had to sit with this and try and figure out what part of this was my doing, and how to change it, because this year I once again chose a partner who was not walking with me. Except this time not only was he not walking with me but he was subtly trying to kick my feet from under me every chance he got.

I once again entered into a relationship desperate to find love and instead found a beautiful disaster. Love is a blessing, this we know. Unrequited love is toxic, and it can eat you alive.

Falling in love can be a slippery slope, regardless of any protective barriers we may have built. It can ease in like a light a mist that settles itself beautifully over your life, or it can blindside you.

Often we fall in love with a person before we have fully gotten to know them. By this point it’s too late—you’ve already stretched your heart for someone capable of bruising it. This is what love requires: utmost vulnerability and trust. Hopes and expectations rise along with the awareness that it can slip away.

I suggest we do our best to live in the moment. Love is elastic. It stretches and retracts and changes shape constantly. It is very uncertain. One day you are over the moon and the next disillusioned.

The elastic can break. You can re-tie it, but there is now a knot. Suddenly that perfect perception of the other person is a little bit tainted. Something rocked the pedestal. Sometimes we can recover from this, sometimes we can’t. 

Loyalty and commitment teach us that we are not to walk away from people that we love. Buddhism teaches us to love without expectation. There are a lot of belief systems about love and I question them often. If your love is shared and you are both happy I assume you wouldn’t have to question love at all.

But if your relationship, be it friendship or romantic love, is unbalanced and one person is hurting, how much is enough? How many pieces are supposed to break and how damaged can we allow ourselves to get before we throw these belief systems out the window and accept that this type of love isn’t healthy?

How do we do what is best for ourselves without damaging the heart and mind of someone else in the process?

Love and relationships require work and responsibility. We have to learn when to stretch and when to break.

For those of you who have been blessed to find a romantic love that is equally shared, I truly admire this and I have set the intention to find it one day. I think it all starts with being aware, open, and ready.

For a long time I didn’t believe I would find love so I subconsciously chose partners who I knew would be a challenge. I am no longer interested in this challenge. I told myself when my last relationship failed that I would never put myself in a situation where I didn’t know where I stood in someone’s life again; where I felt unsteady and unloved.

Unfortunately I did it again this year and I can promise you that it was the last time. I now know what I would like my relationship with my future partner to feel like, and that is the first step towards being open to receiving this gift. Love is a gift.

I have been tested often this year and with this came the opportunity to learn lessons. I have lived my life openly. I have experienced love and trusted the process. I fell in love, watched it grow, watched it change, and watched it fall apart.

I felt the pain, and still continue to recover from it. My heart is healing and that is a slow process, but it was necessary to hurt to have learned what I learned. For this I am grateful. I’m also grateful to my friends and family who helped me to pick up the pieces when I didn’t have the energy to do it alone.

8 things I have learned about relationships so far:

1. If there is a feeling better than love, I have not felt it. Take the risk and dive in with everything you have.

2. Enjoy the good times together as they are happening and be grateful for them.

3. Stay out of the future and in the moment. Now is certain.

4. Protect both your heart and your partner’s, whether the love is still there or not.We are human and we deserve kindness. We don’t need to add to the burdens we already carry by hurting others. Trust me, it doesn’t make thing better.

5. If your relationship starts to crumble, know when to put it down and let it be. Don’t grind it into dust.

6. You cannot continue to give to another person when you are not at your best; when you are so broken, so beaten down that you have no energy left. When talking has failed and words no longer have meaning, this is when you know it is over. When you feel like this, you have to do what is best for the relationship and for each other and wave the white flag to avoid further damage.

7. Some things just won’t work, no matter how badly we wish they would. Sometimes the match that felt so right just isn’t. Please don’t do more damage to your heart by trying to fix something that has past its expiration date. It will leave you raw.

8. It is okay to walk away from something that hurts you. It doesn’t require blame or justification. It just requires you to stop fanning the flames. You will find love again, and next time it will feel better.

Life isn’t easy. Some things build us up and some tear us down. Our hearts expand and break and rebuild—repeatedly. We are constantly learning and changing and growing. If in love you find yourself in a sticky situation like I was, please stop picking at scabs.

Nothing good has ever come from this. Stop the cycle, and let your heart heal so you can find pure love. Surround yourself with loving relationships. Something beautiful is out there waiting for you. If you feel it on the inside, you’ll find it out there.

My gift for today

Wow, I am blown away, I was doing some affirmations, and one I had written was "never accept less than you KNOW you deserve.
this thought brings me to the men I have had in my life, I have always settled for less. My ex-husband wanted some one to keep him according to his wishes, my feelings , thoughts were not necessary.I was there to make him happy, and God help me if I didn't. After 16 years I left him, and lived on my own for almost 30 years. Then there was Jim, this man I fell head over heels in love with, I thought I had found my soul mate, He was looking for some one to replace Jan his former lover whom he has never been able to give up. He never saw me as Robin, I was a huge failure as a replacement.
Recently I have met several men. None of them are interested in Robin, they are like people looking to find a good used car, and because they had luck or problems with previous cars, they pick and choose accordingly.
So again I am not looked as a brand new experience, rather as a replacement of some one they either lost or threw away.
I am so grateful I have had this experience, it has given me an experience I needed to learn.
I now know that I am a valuable human being, that I deserve and will get the love of my life who will choose Robin because she is exactly what he is looking for, and will make his life so much the greater. I will not be a fill in, replacement for or be someones second or third choice.
What a great experience I am so happy today

A positive attitude by Lisa Gache

As an etiquette instructor, most people think my instruction revolves around lessons in poise and posture, the importance of a firm handshake, and proper table manners. What they don’t realize is that, before I get into any of the manners skills training, I begin each and every client session with a very frank conversation about the importance of a positive attitude as being essential to having good manners.

Learning how to be more positive actually led me to my interest in teaching manners in the first place. As a New Yorker, I was born with the natural tendency to look at the more cynical side of everything, often viewing the glass as half-empty rather than half-full. Growing up in a household with an unhappy parent certainly didn’t add to my ability to look on the brighter side of life. It certainly hasn’t been an easy road, however, I had the good fortune to marry someone who is eternally optimistic and has inspired me to move forward in the right direction.

A positive attitude has no prejudice. It is not bound by color, race, or religion. It does not care if one is rich or poor. Anyone has the right to display a positive attitude, and it makes that person much more attractive to others. As far as making a good first impression, a positive attitude (coupled with an ear-to-ear smile) is a sure-fire way to show others you are likable, friendly—and a full participant in your life.

When I decided to immerse myself in manners, I thought long and hard about this concept of a positive attitude and how it can affect our relationships, our interactions, and our everyday circumstances. I began to look at people of all ages and noticed how many walk around with what I call “mad on” faces, like they have the weight of the world on their shoulders, barely able to crack a smile. And I realized that having a positive attitude—like having good manners—is a choice, and requires discipline and practice.

Here are two pieces of etiquette advice that I share with my clients, and that I aspire to live by on a daily basis.

Possess a great attitude!

When you wake up each morning, choose to be upbeat and positive, as this helps to set the tone for the day. Life is one giant possibility, so why not embrace it with an open and willing attitude to try new things and take risks. You only have one lifetime, and there is no point in wallowing in negativity. Make a conscious choice to enjoy a happy and successful life.

Don’t Forget to Smile.

A smile is critical and often overlooked. Find something to be thankful for each day and put a smile on your face. This will win allies and attract friends. A smile is the most inviting of all gestures. If you smile on the outside, your insides will follow suit. Practice your smile each day in front of the mirror when brushing your teeth, and in no time you will have a perfect, authentic smile.

Beverly Hills Manners’ CEO, Lisa Gaché, is one of the foremost etiquette, manners and life skills experts.  Her educational and entertainment company, founded in 2006, is recognized for its new school approach.  Lisa has appeared in the media and contributed to various outlets, including CNN, NPR, “The Today Show,” KTLA-TV, Radio Disney, Woman’s Day, USA Today, The Los Angeles Times, The New York Post and The New York Daily News.  Her contributions to blogs and websites range from the Los Angeles Times, AOL, The Huffington Post and Weddzilla.  Gaché has also been a guest expert on number of reality shows including VH1’s “Charm School” and Discovery Channel’s “Living with Ed.”

From Arielle Ford

God/Goddess and All That Is,

In this moment I am grateful

for the healing of my heart

of EVERYTHING that would stop me

from attracting my soulmate.

In this moment I remember that my perfect,

right partner is magnetizing to me and my only

job is to rest in perfect awareness that their

heart is already joined with mine as I

"savor the waiting."

And so it is..

I love this prayer/dish/desire and plan on using it

horror story

Yesterday I went for supper at my daughters, there were several of her partners family there as well. One in particular was a man they called grandpaw. Here is a man dying on his feet literally, he is quite young under 65, He is a huge man  about 6 feet, 6 inches and I am sure he weighs well over 400 pounds, he is diabetic, he smokes like a steam engine and has many more health issues, so many he is not able to work. He told me that he has been refused long term disability because he smokes and will not loose weight.
I could barely stand near him as he is so negative and in so much pain from all his problems, but refuses to change one iota in his life style. He reminds me of some one standing in the middle of a very busy highway daring any one to hit him, it is going to happen and with him sooner rather than later. I can be stubborn about somethings but God help me if I were that bad. I will not be surprised to hear of his passing, and his family will be devastated. I know they want him to try to be healthy and there for them for many more years, but their hands are tied, and He just stands there in total denial and defiance.  When does the taking responsibility for your actions  become this sort of horror show. this man blames every one and thing but himself for his problem and expects the world to rally around his stubborn idea that he is right. I literally had to leave the room to keep from yelling at him, that he is the creator of all his own problems and that the solution lies with in his reach. I honestly believe I was wrong in walking away and not saying any thing and now I validate it with he wouldn't have listened to me any way. I will never know and it bothers me I saw a man dying on his feet and did nothing. and it makes me angry that I find myself in that sort of situation.

What to do????????

one more time I find myself obsessing about Jim, Now countless time I have gone back and read my journal entries, and I am reminded about how he, never even cared for me and only stayed with me because it was a cheap place to live and I looked after him. This still hurts like blazes, in fact I am wondering if i am obsessing over him because I want to hurt him like he hurt me.I honestly do not want him back in my life, he is way to much of a drain on my energy and bank account. But I want to keep in touch with him and know what is going on in his life, so like what is my problem.
Possibly it is I want a relationship with a man that will love me as much as I loved Jim. I know I am more than capable of having a very loving passionate life style. and I admit it I miss it terribly, it may have been all pretend with Jim but I was head over heels in love with him. And I want that kind of feeling again, I know I can feel it I just can't see it happening with some one other than Jim, and yet IT will never happen again with him, I will not let that happen.
See how crazy and mixed up I get. I have been spending hours on the computer looking for sites with inspirational sayings and thoughts to get me through these awful days of longing. I found out about the "Law of Attraction" and I believe that it truly does work, but in order for it to work you have to be very clear and concise as to what you want to happen. and I get lost between the feelings and the vision. I keep putting Jim in as the lover because that is what worked for me before and yet my mind is saying "are you out of your #$%&^^**&^@ mind you do not ever want to go back and be with that man.
I feel as if I am lost and have no idea where I am at
., and am running around in circles chasing my own tail. What to do?

an excellent read, with a lot of wisdom

The Elephant Rope
~ Author Unknown

As a man was passing the elephants, he suddenly stopped, confused by the fact that these huge creatures were being held by only a small rope tied to their front leg. No chains, no cages. It was obvious that the elephants could, at anytime, break away from their bonds but for some reason, they did not.

He saw a trainer nearby and asked why these animals just stood there and made no attempt to get away. “Well,” trainer said, “when they are very young and much smaller we use the same size rope to tie them and, at that age, it’s enough to hold them. As they grow up, they are conditioned to believe they cannot break away. They believe the rope can still hold them, so they never try to break free.”

The man was amazed. These animals could at any time break free from their bonds but because they believed they couldn’t, they were stuck right where they were.

Like the elephants, how many of us go through life hanging onto a belief that we cannot do something, simply because we failed at it once before?

Failure is part of learning; we should never give up the struggle in life.