The Grief and Happiness Alliance

Happiness

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.

Peace on Earth

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When I was in high school, the Vietnam War was raging. I lived in my small hometown of Porterville, California. Our town had more war deaths per capita than any other community in the country. When a model of the Vietnam Memorial was created to take around the country, that journey was started in Porterville.

My memories were of singing songs for peace, wearing flowers in our hair. I had a denim jacket covered with war protest buttons saying things like Make Love, Not War. When any of the guys were drafted, they married their girlfriends to be sure they would have been able to make love at least once in their lives and that they would have someone to focus on for a reason to come home.

My father was a veteran of World War 2, my husband was a veteran of the Korean War, my other husband was part of the Vietnam war as part of a special government program, and my son-in-law served in Dessert Storm. War has been a constant in my life. While we are not officially at war in the US, we have way too much political fighting going on. I was hoping when we pulled out of Afghanistan that maybe, finally we would live in peace. I think of Rodney King’s quote during the Riots after the acquittal of the police officers who had beaten and tased him. He said, “Can’t we all just get along?”

We seem to live in a society that can’t be happy. But life doesn’t have to be that way. As individuals, we can choose to focus on peace and love. The more people who start doing this, the move love and peace we can have in the world. In the past, studies have been done where people around the world set the intention for peace all at the same time, and during the time they focused together on peace, violence dropped significantly worldwide. Just think of how we could stop this current war if everyone focused on peace and love.

Much can be done by letting go of anger and blame and always and focusing on love. Nelson Mandela was imprisoned on Robin Island for 18 of the 27 years of his imprisonment. In the early years he was frequently beaten and abused severely. Finally, he made the decision to love his jailers and not judge them. When he did this, the jailers gradually stopped beating him and withholding food. Eventually they started respecting him. He wasn’t telling him that he loved them.  He was demonstrating it through his love and expressing it in his prayers. When he became President of South Africa, many of these jailers became his bodyguards.

When I visited Robin island, my tour was led by one of his jailers. He told us how much he learned from Mandala’s example of peace and love. He told us that his life and the lives of the other jailers were permanently changed. Mandala didn’t raise a weapon. He didn’t fight back. He just loved them.

I encourage us all to stop criticizing what is happening. Just observe it, and in the process send love to all involved. This goes for all the government in our country too.  The more we focus on hate and controversy, the more hate and controversy we will continue to have.  The only way this situation can be improved is if we all, everybody, focus on peace and love.

At Unity Church at the end of their services they sing this song:

PEACE SONG

Let there be peace on earth, and let it begin with me.
Let there be peace on earth, the peace that was meant to be.
With God as Creator, family all are we.
Let us walk with each other, in perfect harmony.
Let peace begin with me, let this be the moment now.
With every step I take, let this be my joyous vow.
To take each moment, and live each moment in peace eternally.
Let there be peace on earth, and let it begin with me.

(https://www.unityonthebay.org/peace-song)

 

Let’s all sing this together. We can change the world.

 

 

 

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.

Story Telling

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My family lived through the Depression, yet I never would have known that had I not taken a US History class in high school. People just didn’t talk about those days. Actually, my family didn’t talk much about the past at all. I was a curious child, but there were no answers for me. I was a young adult before I started getting any answers.  All my grandparents were gone by then.

I asked my father’s older sister about his childhood, and she did tell me a few things. Their mother died when Daddy was young from milk leg, that’s what we call thrombophlebitis. This happened when she was giving birth to twins and all three of them died.  Dad’s two older sisters, my dad, and their father had a wagon they took from one oilfield job to the next in Oklahoma. They slept in a tent in the snow until the ten caught on fire and burned all their possessions.  At one point, Daddy had to walk close to an Indian Reservation on his way to school. His mother was Native American, and he looked very much like her.   His sisters were terrified that he would be kidnapped and taken to the Reservation to live, so every morning they would powder him with flour to dull his beautiful bronze coloring.

Daddy and his family migrated to California in 1929 just when the dust bowl started.  I was in an original play when I was in college that was created from the oral history project of the Oakie migration.  I tried to get Daddy to share stories of that time, but he wouldn’t talk about it.   I think he was embarrassed. I missed so much.

I didn’t know much about my mother’s family either.  She had 4 sisters and one brother.  I didn’t even know my grandmother had been married twice, and one sister and her brother was from that marriage.  I found that out when long after my grandmother died, and I was cleaning out my mother’s garage.  I found a pile of letters all tied up with a pretty bow. The letters turned out to be between Grandma and her first husband. He worked about 30 miles away from where they lived, so they only got together on weekends. He got sick at work one day, so they put him on a train to go to the nearest hospital.  He died of appendicitis on the way. Their letters and all the condolence letters people sent to grandma were beautiful and filled with love.

My growing up stories had to do with my parents being involved with Veterans of Foreign Wars. Even though we lived in a small town in central California, my Dad was able raise through the ranks to become Department (California) Commander. Mom and Dad traveled lots to meetings while I stayed with my grandmother or aunts.  I did get to go along on a couple of trips. One was to Detroit for a national convention where two presidential candidates spoke, John F, Kennedy, and Richard Nixon, then Vice President of the United States.  I attended both their speeches, and I got to actually touch Kennedy and shake hands with Nixon. I shook with amazement for days.

In the summer after sixth grade, we drove from California to Miami Beach for another convention. We had wonderful stops along the way at the Grand Canyon, Carlsbad Caverns, New Orleans, and more. What affected me most as an 11-year-old was seeing signs for White’s Only and Colored Only drinking fountains and on restaurant doors. My parents couldn’t explain to me why those were there. I started trying to learn all I could about something that just didn’t make sense to me.

I could continue to write about experiences I have had that led me to be who I am today.  These things are all my story, my beliefs, my priorities. Telling stories is an art that is passed down through generations. Our stories introduce who we are.  In my book I share stories of my grief and the grief that other people have experienced.  Often it is easier to get a point across when prefaced by a story.

What stories do you tell? What stories have you not shared? What stories do you want to be remembered for?

Tell your story.

Start now—

 

 

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.

Do You Trust the Universe?

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Do you pay attention to the universe? In my younger years I lived in a bubble of paying attention only to what was directly around me. There was so much I had to focus on: Would I be able to pay the bills? Would I be able to find childcare I trusted and could afford? Would I have time to do everything I knew I needed to? Would I ever be truly happy? With questions like these hanging over my head, I felt constantly stressed and tired.  I found myself wondering if what I was experiencing was going to be the best experience of my life, and that made me sad.

I spent my life doing, never still.  At one point I had two full time jobs and actively participated in all aspects of the theatre at the same time.  Keeping busy allowed me to block my disappointment of what I lacked, making me think if I just completed one more thing, that would bring me happiness. But it didn’t.

When Ron and I got together, my life began to open. I learned that I didn’t have to be in constant motion. I learned how to be still and focus on all the beauty that surrounded me. Not the beauty of material things, but the beauty of taking deep breaths, the beauty of the nature that surrounded me.  The beauty of the song of the birds. The beauty of the love in Ron’s eyes. Up until this time, I had proclaimed that stress was my life. As I slowed down, I discovered that instead, my life is love.

More than romantic love, I felt the love of the universe surrounding me and protecting me. I realized that the universe was, is, and will always be there. Instead of focusing on what littered my path, I focused on seeing the beauty of it all. I saw that the universe is here to support me, and everyone else who inhabits it. The key is to recognize this and embrace it.

I talked to a woman who had gone to a desolate place in Africa on a humanitarian journey. She went there to help people. Her group went to see a group of people who lived in a community they had created in the desert. She had grand plans of educating them to do things she was familiar with to help them like proper nutrition, exercise, acceptable housing (acceptable to her and her group).

What they discovered was a joyous group functioning as one big, loving family. They had discovered how to eat with the food they would find together, and they were healthy. And no one was overweight. They had few material possessions, and they didn’t need them. Their clothing was minimal as they honored the beauty of their bodies, and they certainly didn’t need the warmth of clothing in the desert. And they had much more exercise than most of the people from the “civilized” country of the people who had come to train them. They bathed together, ate together, travelled together, cared for each other, and smiled, and danced, and loved with abandon.

The woman learned much more from them than what was in the lessons she had come to share. She came home a changed woman paying attention to what she focused on. She became a philanthropist focusing on projects that encouraged awareness of how to protect the planet and how to bring even more love and beauty into the world.

My focus changed after I spoke to her. I realized that all my material needs were met. I learned to focus on how I can help people live their best lives from a place of love and service. All I do now is focus on that, and what I wonderful life I am living now.  I have been widowed twice, and instead of feeling sorry for me, I feel grateful for the love and experiences I had with these two wonderful men. And I use the lessons I learned from them both to bring as much happiness in the world as I can as we learn to support our world the very best we can.

And do you know what?  The universe fully supports us in all we do!

 

“When we learn to trust the universe, we shall be happy, prosperous, and well.” Ernest Holmes

 

 

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.

Be Willing

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I spend time online each day with the social media I do to help people deal with grief, and lately I keep hearing the same theme.  People say that things will never be the same, that they have lost so much, and they feel lost. I’ve had times that I have felt that way too. I get sentimental about not having someone to hold hands with, to talk to intimately, to kiss, to laugh with, to share my bed. When I would start feeling this way, I would write or meditate, or just sit and think about how wonderful those experiences were.

I know I won’t have those exact experience again. No one does. Each moment in our lives is different.  When I remind myself of that, I start thinking about how each day is a new day, an opportunity to start to do different things or do things differently.  As I reflect on my life I am amazed at the experiences, the opportunities I’ve had.  I think about all the miraculous adventures, the breathtaking art, the first smiles of a baby.

When we can start to shift gear, to focus on what makes us happy instead of what makes us sad, or made us sad in the past, then we can start lifting our heads, looking forward, becoming aware.  That awareness allows us to take slow deep breaths again and feel how wonderful that fresh air feels.

I invite you find someplace beautiful and quiet to sit imagining your loved one sitting next to you. Enjoy that feeling knowing that in that moment there is no physical pain, no suffering. All that is gone now, and you can just relish the closeness. Then tell your loved one about something new you are doing that feels good. It could be finding new things to cook for yourself, planting seeds in your garden for spring flowers, walking in a forest or on a beach. It could be reading a great book or enjoying a movie or enjoying a conversation with a friend. As you are sharing all this, start to realize that you are relaxing as you speak. Tension flows away. You can feel all that love which remains.

At this moment you realize that your loved one is smiling, delighted that you can smile, you can appreciate all that is good and beautiful. I can imagine the relief my loved one would feel knowing that I wasn’t trapped in an unrelenting sorrow, that I am taking one step at a time to move forward, never discarding all the love I will always have for each of my loved ones who is no longer physically with me. Just by being willing, being open, we all can allow ourselves to celebrate the wonder and awe that awaits our awareness.

Be willing—

 

 

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.