Tag: lessons

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Good Advice

I love reading the thoughts and advice of folks who have been around the block a time or two. I’m fast approaching their age and have seen for myself how valuable listening to others wisdom can positively impact my life.

I’d like to share something written by Regina Brett, a 90-year-old woman from Cleveland, Ohio. Her advice was printed in the local newspaper, The Plain Dealer.

She offers 45 lessons life has taught her. Obviously, they may not all apply to each of us, but there are so many good ones. I thought I’d pass them all along to you and you can decide for yourself which ones might make your world a better place.

Occasionally, I’ve added my own editorial comment in parentheses after her suggestion.

Life isn’t fair, but it’s still good

When in doubt, just take the next small step.

Life is too short to waste time hating anyone.

Your job won’t take care of you when you are sick. Your friends and family will. Stay in touch.

Pay off your credit cards every month.

You don’t have to win every argument. Agree to disagree.

Cry with someone. It’s more healing than crying alone.

It’s okay to get angry with God. He can take it. (or substitute ‘She’ or other pronoun or your word for God)

Save for retirement starting with your first paycheck.

When it comes to chocolate, resistance is futile.

Make peace with your past so it won’t screw up your present.

It’s okay to let your children see you cry. (even if you are a man)

Don’t compare your life to others. You have no idea what their journey is all about.

If a relationship has to be a secret, you shouldn’t be in it.

Everything can change in the blink of an eye. But don’t worry, God never blinks.

Take a deep breath. It calms the mind.

Get rid of anything that isn’t useful, beautiful or joyful.

Whatever doesn’t kill you really does make you stronger. (Not so sure about this one)

It’s never too late to have a happy childhood. But the second one is you to you and no one else.

When it comes to going after what you love in life, don’t take no for an answer. (as long as it doesn’t hurt others)

Burn the candle, use the nice sheets, wear the fancy lingerie, don’t save it for a special occasion. Today is special.

Over prepare, then go with the flow.

Be eccentric now. Don’t wait for old age to wear purple.

The most important sex organ is the brain.

No one is in charge of your happiness but you.

Frame every so-called disaster with these words, “In five years will this matter?”

Always choose life.

Forgive everyone everything.

What other people think of you is none of your business.

Time heals almost everything. Give time time.

However good or bad a situation is, it will change.

Don’t take yourself so seriously. No one else does.

Believe in miracles.

God loves you because of who God is, not because of anything you did or didn’t do.

Don’t audit life. Show up and make the most of it now.

Growing old beats the alternative– dying young.

Your children get only one childhood.

All that truly matter in the end is that you loved.

Get outside every day. Miracles are waiting everywhere.

If we all threw our problems in a pile and saw everyone else’s, we’d grab ours back.

Envy is a waste of time. You already have all you need.

The best is yet to come.

No matter how you feel, get up, dress up and show up.

Yield.

Life isn’t tied with a bow, but it’s a gift.

So, there they are. I hope some of them are worth taking along on your life journey. Be well.

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How Do I Love Me

Who taught you about love? It might be hard to remember. It may go back so many years that you’re not even sure.

I believe all babies come to earth filled with love, ready to be held, so that they can share their overwhelming sense of wonder with anyone who picks them up.

I certainly felt this when I held my children and grandchildren. I looked into each of their eyes to see if they could remind me what heaven was like. I gazed at them and felt a beautiful sense of oneness and closeness. And I fell into their bright, shiny faces, absorbed in their afterglow.

I felt as much coming into me as I was sending into them. Each of them taught me about love.

Sometimes I wish I could remember what it felt like to arrive here on earth. To be the one held. I imagine what a difficult trip it must have been, having my first breath squeezed out of me and needing desperately to have my lungs filled with air. Then trying to adjust to all the open space around me and the chill and bright lights and commotion. It’s no wonder that many babies scream. I want to, just thinking about it.

As a baby’s days pass and their experiences deepen, I wonder, how are they to learn about life? Who will listen to them for the clues that they are ready to learn? Who will be their teachers?

Will it be an interaction, an exchange of the meanings of life or will the baby have to do all the receiving and not be allowed to do any of the teaching?

As the baby becomes a child, the lessons begin. All sorts of things must be learned. What ‘hot’ means. That food belongs in your mouth, not on your head or the floor. That scissors are pointed, and that most animals have soft fur, but very sharp teeth.

After a while the lessons shift from being primarily about safety and become about understanding the world. There is a process of discovery. What a color is and what letters are and how numbers work together.

All of this is important. Necessary even.

But what about love? Who teaches us about this? Is it someone who knows what it means and how it is shared? Or do we sometimes learn from someone, who themselves, was never taught and can therefore not teach?

Are we shown examples to follow? And if so, what do they tell us about love? Is there harmony between what we are told and what we see happen in the world?

Often there are wide discrepancies, and we are expected to behave according to other’s words and ignore their conflicting actions.

But we know the truth somehow. We can feel it.

And whether we like it or not, it becomes up to each of us to decide about love, especially, the love we feel for ourselves. We may be fortunate enough to have had wonderful role-models to follow, but if not, we owe it to ourselves to be our own source of love.

I believe that deep inside each of us there is an inexhaustible wellspring of love. It’s inside already, waiting to be tapped. We don’t have to look outside to find it. And we don’t have to wait for anyone else to give it to us. We can give it to ourselves.

I believe this is the truth because we all came here with it. Each of us was wrapped up in love.

We show our self love by giving ourselves permission to release all the lessons we’ve been taught by others that do not feel true to us, and recognize that they may have meant no harm while teaching us. They just didn’t know better.

We show our self love when we forgive those who failed to help us understand, that the most important love, is that which we show ourselves. Then we can move on.

We show our self love when we accept that we are all beautiful, radiant beings, able to embrace the truth that we are all lovable. And in this way, we take charge of answering the question, how do I love me.

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Lessons or Experiences

From the folks I’ve talked to, there seems to be a consensus that school is focused on learning specific lessons. The expectation appears to be that the student does not know anything, so must be taught by the teacher. Further, it is assumed that the teacher knows what would be valuable for the student to learn.

The closer you are to educational systems, the more you realize that it’s all about the curriculum chosen. There is no way that any one teacher or any one student could know all things, so choices must be made and priorities decided about what to focus on in the classroom.

Inevitably, certain events and facts get lost in the shuffle. And then, there is the tendency to slant important details to suit whoever is in charge.

A glaring case in point was demonstrated to me during one of Maureen’s and my vacations. We visited Vancouver, Canada (absolutely gorgeous, by the way) and were fascinated to discover an enormous mural depicting a series of skirmishes that resulted in Canada winning a major battle against the United States. We looked at each other and asked ourselves, “Didn’t our textbooks say that we won that? We could have sworn they were quite specific on that point.”

Hmmm?

Well, no matter. I mean, it happened so long ago. What difference does it really make?

Perhaps, if it were an isolated instance, it wouldn’t matter. But it has ramifications far beyond which side actually won, because it’s unclear if there is a definitive correct answer, so what level of trust can you put in any of your lessons?

Along with many others I know, I come across events in my life and one of my first reactions is to wonder if there is a ‘lesson’ in it for me.

In school we are taught to learn our lessons. If we fail to do that, we’re told, we’ll need to repeat the class, UNTIL we’ve learned our lesson. This is potent stuff, unless you like summer school.

One trip there was enough to cure me. Who would want, after a very long school year, to spend the hot summer in a stuffy classroom trying to relearn a subject you didn’t like in the first place? No one, that’s who.

Here’s the real rub for me.

This whole idea of having to learn our lessons gets carried over into the rest of our lives. When faced with dilemmas and problems that don’t feel resolvable to us, I often hear people say to one another, “well, I guess you’ve haven’t learned your lesson yet.”

Beyond this not being the least bit helpful, it perpetuated the idea that there is one correct answer, and clearly, we’ve missed it.

I’d like to offer an alternative thought for your consideration.

Suppose there are NO specific lessons for you to have to learn. And, of course, this means there are no lessons you have to repeat until you get them right.

What if life is just a series of experiences? Simple experiences, without right and wrong answers. Without implications or attached judgements? Would that change things for you?

When I shift away from ‘lessons’ and focus on ‘experiences’, it makes a powerful difference to me. I can let go of worrying about getting life ‘right’ and open to the treasure inside of each of the experiences I encounter.

I admit that sometimes I have to dig deeply to uncover the treasure, but I’ve found it is always there waiting for me.

Perhaps if you give this shift a chance, you’ll find all of the treasure you are searching for. I certainly hope so.

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