Gratitude

Everything is a Miracle

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Do you recognize when miracles occur in your life? I hadn’t considered this before, but once I started noticing miracles, I started noticing how I have experienced so many miracles though-out my life.

Miracles can be huge, and they also can be very small. You may not have thought about this before, but chances are you are experiencing miracles too, and you have been all along but may not have been aware when they happened. As I look back, I remember the miracle of getting accepted at the last minute to San Diego State University. I see this as a miracle because I had a major health challenge in high school and was barely able to graduate with a grade point average that normally wouldn’t have qualified.

My husband and I bought our first house together in 2009 at a great price because of the financial crisis in our country. A year later, my elderly mother-in-law needed to move in with us, and our home was comfortable for just two people. We decided to sell it and buy another. Our real estate agent warned us we would be losing money because of the financial crisis.  We sold the house that we had only owned for a year at a significant profit a week after we listed it, and we bought another, much bigger home in a wonderful location for $200,000 lest than it was listed for. I know we were blessed with this miracle because we welcomed my mother-in-law to live with us.

Recently when I was driving on a divided highway, a truck crossed the center divider headed directly headed at the driver’s door at high speed. When I saw him coming toward me, I closed my eyes thinking there was no way I could survive this. I heard and felt the thump as he hit my car. I was shocked when I opened my eyes and saw that my car was not destroyed, only three thousand dollars’ worth of damage that his insurance covered. And he didn’t hit anyone else as he continued speeding head on into traffic until he could pull off to the side of the road. The witnesses were shocked that the driver, my son, and I weren’t killed. I know this was a miracle.

Just last week in the middle of the night we were experiencing a big windstorm. We have power lines that go across our property and into the tree of my friend’s house across the road. The wind snapped the power lines which set the trees on fire as the wires dropped to the ground. This could have been a catastrophe. Instead, our homes didn’t catch on fire, no one was injured, and the power company came out the next day and did a nice trimming on what was left of the trees. Everyone affected by this are so grateful for this miracle.

Beyond the many big miracles I experience, I experience little miracles every day. I almost always get right to the front of any line I am in, and I always find parking places easily.  I also get where I am going at the time that I plan to.  Every day I now notice the miracles I experience, and I am grateful.

The title of this blog is a quote by Albert Einstein: “Everything is a Miracle.”

Notice and enjoy all your miracles!

Everything is a Miracle

 

 

You can join the Grief and Happiness Alliance which meets weekly on Sundays by clicking here: https://www.griefandhappiness.com/offers/ytK7eLBa

You can order Loving and Living Your Way Through Grief by clicking here at Amazon.

You can listen to my podcast, Grief and Happiness, here. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/loving-and-living-your-way-through-grief-with/id1509589686?i=1000535381763

I would be happy to put you on the reminder list for or Writing Together Through Grief occurring on Saturdays each week by sending an email to me to emily@lovingandlivingyourwaythroughgrief.com and giving me your email address.

Join my Facebook group here.

Your Relationship With Money

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When dealing with the transition of a loved one, especially someone you had money in common with, finances can be a challenge.  For me this came up with both of my husbands, and also my Mother and my Aunt who I had conservatorship of. With my husbands there was much I had to do with bank accounts, credit cards, investments, medical expenses, taxes, and funeral expenses.

Fortunately, I had shared all of our financial matters with my husbands. Unfortunately, I didn’t have the opportunity to know about my mother’s or my aunt’s finances. My mother and my aunt both were diagnosed with inoperable brain tumors. I didn’t see this coming in either case, so I didn’t get to ask them what they wanted me to do with their finances before it was too late.

What helped me the most was my relationship with money. Much of my life money caused anxiety for me for a variety of reasons. I knew I could do better.  A friend recommended the Book The Soul of Money by Lynn Twist to me.  Reading that book allowed me to change my whole perspective on money so that I haven’t stressed about it since, and I have more money and donate more money than I ever thought possible. I highly recommend you read this book too.

Lynn Twist was the fund-raiser for the World Hunger Project and is the co-founder for the Pachamama Alliance which empowers indigenous people of the Amazon rainforest to preserves their land and culture. She has a rich background in service to others and working internationally with people from Mother Teresa to corporate executives. She developed her own philosophy on what money is and believes it is a gift she has been given to pass on to others, and she does just that.

This is Lynn’s description of her Book: “This book is about living consciously, fully, and joyfully in our relationship with money, and learning to understand and embrace its flow. This is your opportunity to embark on a rare journey, one that aligns money and soul, to transform your life.”

I feel so strongly about this book and the invaluable lessons I learned which totally changed my relationship with money. I now love money, I love what it can facilitate, I love being generous and philanthropic, and I have no financial worries anymore.  Of course, I had to do much more than just read the book, but the book helped me transform my thinking about money forever.

And I feel so strongly about this that I will send the book to the first five people who email to tell me they would like a copy. I love to pay it forward by sharing this book.

And if you have read it, please let me know and tell me how it affected you!

 

You can join the Grief and Happiness Alliance which meets weekly on Sundays by clicking here: https://www.griefandhappiness.com/offers/ytK7eLBa

You can order Loving and Living Your Way Through Grief by clicking here at Amazon.

You can listen to my podcast, Grief and Happiness, here. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/loving-and-living-your-way-through-grief-with/id1509589686?i=1000535381763

I would be happy to put you on the reminder list for or Writing Together Through Grief occurring on Saturdays each week by sending an email to me to emily@lovingandlivingyourwaythroughgrief.com and giving me your email address.

Join my Facebook group here.

Unconditional Love

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Most of my life I had no idea what unconditional love was. I hadn’t thought much about love in general. I knew my parents loved me, but many times it seemed conditional. The first time I thought I fell in love, I realized that we could only be in love if I was perfect in his eyes in all things, and I wasn’t.  I learned from that the importance of being and doing what someone else expected of me. All that did for me is help me lower my self-esteem.

When my first baby was born, one night nursing him in the middle of the night, I realized what deep, true love really was. He was so little and so fully dependent on me. And I loved caring for him.  I also realized at that moment how my mother must have felt about me, but she was never able to demonstrate it.

I went through life thinking I could find true love if only circumstances were different. If only I was prettier, if only I got better grades, if only I had a magnificent job, if only I married a doctor, if only I was shorter (I grew to six feet tall when I was in seventh grade). All of those if onlys didn’t help me a bit.

When I met Jacques, I learned so much more about love. He loved me just the way I was, and I loved him that way too. I discovered along the way that we developed what I consider now to be a bad habit of judging people, and when you are judging others, you really are judging yourself too, and I fell back into that “if only” place I thought I had left behind.

We were both teaching college, and we’d say if only our students would pay more attention or take their education more seriously.  We both did lots of theatre and we were always complaining about actors not memorizing their lines or missing rehearsals. That judgement of others got in the way of us living our best lives.

I started learning about unconditional love from Ron. If I started to complain, he would say, wouldn’t it be better to do something positive about an issue than to get upset about it? That was hard for me at first, but I eventually realized that it is not my place to judge anyone else. When I learned that, the gateway began to open for me.

I finally started taking responsibility for myself. I stopped finding fault with others. That enabled me to make a huge shift. I started to love people for who they were. I choose to spend time with people I enjoy being with and I don’t judge them. And I don’t judge myself.

Why am I writing about all this right now? I have been observing the state of the world. So much of what is happening that is negative comes from judgement and hate. We could all learn from the song Hal David and Bert Bacharach wrote and Jackie DeShannon sang in the mid-sixties, What the World Needs Now:

What the world needs now is love, sweet love

It’s the only thing there is just too little of . . . .

No not just for some, but for everyone.

Imagine what our world would be now if we all chose to love one another instead of judging them. What if we are all at the beginning of a huge shift in the world? We can be if choose to.

Start right now. Remember the deepest love you have experienced or that you would love to experience. How does that feel? Take that feeling and pay it forward. If you realize you are judging someone or something, forgive yourself, forgive whoever you need to, and then start spreading that beautiful, unconditional love. May it circulate all over the world and beyond.

 

You can join the Grief and Happiness Alliance which meets weekly on Sundays by clicking here: https://www.griefandhappiness.com/offers/ytK7eLBa

You can order Loving and Living Your Way Through Grief by clicking here at Amazon.

You can listen to my podcast, Grief and Happiness, here. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/loving-and-living-your-way-through-grief-with/id1509589686?i=1000535381763

I would be happy to put you on the reminder list for or Writing Together Through Grief occurring on Saturdays each week by sending an email to me to emily@lovingandlivingyourwaythroughgrief.com and giving me your email address.

Join my Facebook group here.

Don’t Wait!

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My amazing granddaughter, Katie Thiroux, is a fabulous Jazz Singer and upright bass musician and is loved by all-time jazz great Quincy Jones who calls her “Katie-Toes.”. Quincy told her “Be prepared for the opportunities you want. Don’t wait.” Her response to this sage advice is “It’s not about perfection, it’s about being ready IN THE MOMENT.” What a wise woman she is.  She has followed her own advice and has performed all over the world in amazing venues, her podcast, The Hump where she interviews her favorite jazz artists every week, is crazy popular, and she teaches wherever she goes.  I love that she says, “I received amazing opportunities growing up and I am thankful to be in a position to give back, it’s my duty, dig?”

How inspiring is that! I love to follow her example.  This year I am participating in Marci Shimoff’s Your Year of Miracles. One of our activities is to create a theme for the year.  Mine is “Inspired Fulfilled Opportunities.”  I have been paying attention to this intention I set, and I realized I am inspired all the time, but this inspiration is wasted if I don’t pay attention to it. And my inspired intentions easily come to fruition when I commit to acting toward them. And recognizing the opportunities that come my way, I pay attention and act on them and voila! There they are! Isn’t that grand?

Much of my life, I wasn’t paying enough attention to inspiration. I would reflect and say, “If only I had done that when I had the chance.” Do you do that, regret actions you didn’t take? That’s the first step: recognizing what you didn’t do. Now that you can see that, you can change that behavior. If you think something like, “I wish I knew how to draw pictures, or sing, or play the bass,” what happens if you don’t take action? Nothing. That’s right, no action, no benefits. Now that you recognize that, when you say “I would love to be able to (fill in the blank),” you know exactly what to do. Take action on your desire. That’s the only way you will get it.

My friend invited me to help him with a grief retreat that’s coming up.  I’ve been thinking for a couple of years about how much I would love to be in on the planning of a grief retreat to be sure happiness is included, and I got asked to do just that. In the past, I could see myself talking me out of doing this. Not this time! We are going full steam ahead to help create an amazing retreat at Unity Village in October!  I hope you’ll come! Actually, I know you will come if you follow your inspiration to do so.

What are you ready for right now? Have you been putting off taking a class, hosting friends for a game night, dancing to a live band all because of the pandemic? If you are ready, take action! Of course, there are still considerations to stay safe, but you know how to do that. Or have you been thinking you should donate to something to help the people of Ukraine but you haven’t yet because there are so many choices you could make. Don’t let choices paralyze you. Take action on what you believe in.

What advantages have you had in your life that inspire you to give back in honor of that? I learned so much from learning how to play the flute, and I put that into use when I was in my high school band, which was an exceptional group. From doing that, I learned so many values, like integrity, dependability, kindness, and self-confidence. I took what I learned there into raising my children, teaching my classes, writing my books, creating my live theatre and school of arts, and supporting Maui Jazz Camp that Katie and her very talented husband drummer Matt Witek created. All these opportunities enriched my life as well as the lives of all those involved.

How can you give back? What can you say yes to? What kindness that someone did for you can you pay forward by helping someone else?

Would you love to be happy? You can! Just pay attention to your inspiration. Stay open. Stay ready. And say yes!

 

 

Sign up here for the very special gathering of the Grief and Happiness Alliance where we’ll introduce you to what we do. A great place to make friends! https://www.griefandhappiness.com/special-events

 

You can join the Grief and Happiness Alliance which meets weekly on Sundays by clicking here: https://www.griefandhappiness.com/offers/ytK7eLBa

You can order Loving and Living Your Way Through Grief by clicking here at Amazon.

You can listen to my podcast, Grief and Happiness, here. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/loving-and-living-your-way-through-grief-with/id1509589686?i=1000535381763

I would be happy to put you on the reminder list for or Writing Together Through Grief occurring on Saturdays each week by sending an email to me to emily@lovingandlivingyourwaythroughgrief.com and giving me your email address.

Join my Facebook group here.

Bird Lessons

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A new pet has adopted me.  I probably wouldn’t have chosen him.  He just ended up in my yard and decided it was the place for him to be.  My son even named him Rodney the Rooster.  Roosters are ubiquitous in Hawaii. You’ll see them at airports, in parking lots, and at outdoor restaurants. Unfortunately, Rodney didn’t learn the lesson about crowing at sunrise. He crows all night and during the daytime, too.  Now he brought home a lady friend, and I am OK with that since he’s not quite as noisy, and together they feed on bugs that visit my garden, especially my roses. Watching him strut around my property, I started thinking about all the birds in my life.

When I was a child, a neighbor built an aviary in his back yard. I could hear all the birds and just had to see what they looked like, so I ventured out to peek over his fence.  He noticed me and invited me in.  I was fascinated. He was raising parakeets to sell to the store in town that sold birds, cages, and bird food.  He taught me how to take care of them, feeding them and cleaning up the aviary. He even taught me how to clip their wings. I was so much help to him that he gave me a light blue parakeet and a cage, with my parents’ permission of course. I very carefully clipped my bird’s wings so he wouldn’t be able to fly away from me. Unfortunately, he couldn’t fly away from my sister’s cat either.  The last I saw of him was his tail feathers sticking out of the cat’s mouth. I was devastated with this early lesson on life and death.

A favorite bird we had after I was married was a finch amazon parrot. He was huge, beautiful, and loud. He used to say “Hello pretty boy” all the time, and our whole neighborhood knew when it was dawn. We learned to cover his cage at night which fooled him into thinking that it wasn’t dawn until his cage was uncovered.  We had to leave for a couple of days, so we made sure he had plenty of food and water like we had before whenever we went away.  This time though, somehow, he managed to knock over his water, so we found that beautiful boy laying in the bottom of his cage when we returned home.  I felt responsible. It broke my heart.

I was done with birds, and then we were given 2 little love birds. They we so cute and sweet with each other.  Then one of them got sick, then I got sick, then the other one got sick, and they both died.  We buried them in the backyard. This happened at a time I didn’t have health insurance and I got very ill. I was sure I had pneumonia. I couldn’t eat, couldn’t sleep.  My breathing was difficult, and I had a bad cough. A friend dropped by who happened to be a veterinarian, and he diagnosed me with psittacosis (parrot fever) because the birds had died, and he and told me what the prescription was that I needed.  Fortunately, my aunt was able to get a prescription for me from the doctor she worked for. We had to dig up the birds and give them to the health department who confirmed the psittacosis.

I learned about life and death, and about the responsibility of having birds for pets.  I decided to only enjoy birds in nature from then on. Moving to Maui has allowed me to do just that. There are so many chickens here, and they always seem to be crossing the road. I am surprised we don’t have Chicken Crossing signs, but they’d have to be everywhere!

Ron and I would sit on our lanai, called a deck on the mainland, and listen to the amazing birds singing, especially in the morning.  So many different songs! They would come and play in the water of our fountain close to the lanai. They almost always were in pairs and were beautiful to watch, especially the cardinals. Ron would go outside at dawn every morning to watch the cattle egrets fly in formation up the volcano we live on the side of.  They always flew right over our house. I think Ron attracted them.

I loved to watch the birds gather components for their nest building.  I am amazed what they found to use.  One bird had a thin piece of plastic that flowed all the way down to the ground. We watched as bit by bit that little bird got all of it into the tree.  I imagined him sharing with his fellow birds since there are so many of them!

I am grateful that I learned the importance of the freedom of the birds.  They don’t live by arbitrary rules that we make up when we capture them. Being free, their songs seem joyful. I’ll continue to listen to all these beautiful birds and take the time to enjoy their lovely songs. And I relish their company even at this distance.

 

You can join the Grief and Happiness Alliance which meets weekly on Sundays by clicking here: https://www.griefandhappiness.com/offers/ytK7eLBa

You can order Loving and Living Your Way Through Grief by clicking here at Amazon.

You can listen to my podcast, Grief and Happiness, here. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/loving-and-living-your-way-through-grief-with/id1509589686?i=1000535381763

I would be happy to put you on the reminder list for or Writing Together Through Grief occurring on Saturdays each week by sending an email to me to emily@lovingandlivingyourwaythroughgrief.com and giving me your email address.

Join my Facebook group here.

Honoring Our Veterans

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Originally known as Armistice Day, November 11 is the day that was chosen to honor veterans because it is the day that is considered the end of World War One, The Great War.  This occurred in 1918 on the eleventh day of the eleventh month at 11 AM.  Where I grew up, Veterans Day was the biggest celebration of the year, even bigger than Christmas and the 4th of July. During the huge Veterans Day Parade, at 11 AM, the air raid sirens would go off and everything ceased. In the silence, everyone either saluted or held their hands over their hearts in recognition of all our veterans and their families.

How times have changed. Now many businesses go on as usual not recognizing the holiday. Parades and celebrations are few. When we think of serving veterans now, what comes to mind are the Veterans Stand Downs that are held around the country as a one-to-four-day event to give a break to veterans who are homeless or poor. They gather to receive food, haircuts, clothes, showers, counseling, and guidance on how to find services they may be entitled to. I found myself in tears writing this blog thinking how incredibly sad it is that we need to do this.  With all these citizens have done for us including sacrificing their own lives, why aren’t they all honored and revered always instead of given handouts once a year?

I was born and raised in a small town in California who had the highest per capita loss of those fighting in the Vietnam War. My girlfriends married their boyfriends when they were drafted because the chances were so high that they wouldn’t return from the war. And if they did, they often had significant losses related to the unimaginable experiences they had while witnessing man’s inhumanity to man.

Today as we celebrate the bravery of these selfless servants, take the opportunity to serve them back.  If you know someone who is serving now, reach out to thank them and their families for the sacrifices they make. If you know someone or have a family member who served in the past, write them a letter whether they are still in this earthly realm or not. I was just thinking about my uncle who had his leg blown off in World War Two.  I am sure I never thanked him while he was still alive. I just never thought to do this. But I am going to today, to write that letter I should have sent long ago. Doing this helps us get in touch with the significance of what our military has done for us.

There is a saying that those who don’t learn from the experiences they had in the past are doomed to repeat them. Let’s learn. Let’s reach out to people who serve or have served us and do what we can to brighten their lives. And above all, let’s not repeat the mistakes of our past.

Thank you, Daddy. Thank you, Uncle Jim. Thank you, Jacques. Thank you, Aunt Mona, Thank you, Ariel.  Thank you, Roy. Thank you, Uncle Glen. Thank you, Steve. Thank you, Jason.  And my deepest gratitude to all my other friends and relatives who have served us all.

 

You can join the Grief and Happiness Alliance which will meet weekly starting November 14 by clicking here: https://www.griefandhappiness.com/offers/ytK7eLBa

You can order Loving and Living Your Way Through Grief by clicking here at Amazon.

I would be happy to put you on the reminder list for or Writing Together Through Grief occurring on Saturdays each week by sending an email to me to emily@lovingandlivingyourwaythroughgrief.com and giving me your email address.

Join my Facebook group here.