All the pretty string

I’m pretty much an introvert. Don’t get me wrong – I love people. I love to hang out with people [once I get there] and I love to talk with people and to get to know people. I love to get up in front of a crowd and talk. I love to go where people are and smile at them for no reason at all. Sometimes they think they know me and stop to chat. Despite my love of people, though, I must say that actually interacting with people exhausts me. After a day in court or a day consulting with existing or potential clients, I need some alone time to recover.

That’s where all the pretty string comes into the picture. I didn’t have many friends when I was a little girl. Truthfully, I’ve never learned the skill of cultivating friendships. While my brother roamed the neighborhood playing with the other little boys, I sat in the house and got underfoot.

I think I was about 8 years old when my mother handed me a ball of yarn (hot pink!) and a crochet hook. She taught me to make a slip knot, and then she wrapped the yarn around my left pinky and through my fingers and then held my little hands in hers and guided me through the first stitches. Once I had the hang of “chaining,” she let go. She told me to keep going until I got to the end of the ball of scratchy pink acrylic yarn.

Periodically the yarn would tangle between my fingers, or I would let go to scratch my nose or go to the bathroom, and I would take my chain back to Mom and ask her to wrap the yarn around my fingers again. She did, and each time she would admire my ever-growing chain.

Honestly, I don’t remember how long it took me to finish that long, long chain, but I think it was long enough to allow her to get some housework done – or perhaps some time alone for a cup of tea.

As the summer progressed, we tore that ball of yarn apart time and time again. She taught me single crochet, then double crochet and half-double crochet. Before the summer was over, I had turned that same ball of hot pink fiber into a ruffled rhumba-style ball gown for my Barbie doll. She looked fabulous.

Like many other hobbies, crochet has come and gone and come again in my life. It was something that I had in common with Mom. Mom loved people too, but they wore her out, and so when I went for a visit, I would frequently take my latest work in progress along. She would work on her doily or her baby sweater, and I would work on my hat, scarf or shawl. When we were stitching, we could talk, or we could be silent – bonding over our mutual love of turning thread to treasures.

I recently purchased A Stash of One’s Own: Knitters on Loving, Loiving with, and Letting to of Yarn, by Clara Parkes. It is a book full of essays by other people who love yarn. It’s not a long book, and I am enjoying it so much that I’ve been “rationing” it – reading just one essay at a time, then surfing Ravelry for patterns designed by the writers.

This morning I read an essay by Franklin Habit and his relationship with needlework and his mother. His mother’s “stash” became an embodiment of her for him, and he spoke of the emotions that surfaced after her death when it came time to process her death – and her stash.

As a child, his mother’s “pretty string” was forbidden. Later in life, their mutual love of “pretty string” brought them together in new ways. It’s a beautiful essay, and well worth a read.

Late last year, in Mom’s final illness, she asked me to bring yarn and a hook to the nursing home where she lay all day. Her occupational therapist encouraged the idea, and I scoured my stash for yarn that was brightly colored and very soft. I grabbed an assortment of crochet hooks from my collection and delivered the package as proudly as a little girl clutching a handful of dandelions from the lawn on Mother’s Day.

Although Mom admired the yarn, it was clear that crocheting together was something we would not be able to do any more. I haven’t finished a crochet project since. The scarf I worked on at the nursing home sits unfinished in my bedroom. Instead, I did something that Mom never really tried. I learned to knit.

My love of pretty string leads to me knitting in public when I am waiting for an appointment or enjoying the sunshine in the park. The yarn attracts people. They want to watch. They want to touch. They want someone to teach them to use the pretty string.

My home is full of pretty balls of string. To be perfectly honest, wrapping yarn around a pair of knitting needles and watching it turn into solid fabric or lace feels like alchemy or magic. I can lose myself in knitting – and frequently do, surrounded by balls of pretty string, losing myself in memories, or making new ones.

Zen and the Art of Knitting

Posted by BecomingBetty

I took a class on world religions when I was in my 30s. I was raised in a evangelical fundamentalist Christian household and community, and the class was my first real exposure to ideas that were not based on the Bible. I was intrigued by both the similarities between religions and the differences.

While most of the religions focused on one or more deities who needed to be pleased or appeased, Buddhism stood apart. Although Siddhartha Gautama, the Buddha, plays an important role in Buddhism, Siddhartha was an earthly prince. He was a human who lived and died.

One of the concepts of Buddhism that I found my mind returning to again and again is the concept of impermanence and non-attachment. I will readily admit that I’m not good at non-attachment.

Buddhist monks may spend days or weeks making intricate sand paintings called mandalas. When the design is completed, rather than affixing it to a board and framing it for all to admire, they pray over it and sweep it away. It is no more. The fact that “mandala art” is become part of rock painting and decorating is antithetical to the very concept of the mandala. Recently I encountered “mandala yarn” used to crochet elaborate wall hangings to be cherished for generations. I considered making one.

I began crocheting when I was a little girl. Mom handed me a crochet hook and a ball of yarn to keep me busy. I was soon crocheting elaborate doll clothes and simple shawls. Although there have been periods in my life when I didn’t crochet for months or even several years at a time, crocheting, and more recently knitting, have been a big part of my life for several years. Learning to knit, for me, has been more than a lesson in arts and crafts. It has been a lesson in embracing imperfection, a lesson in patience, and most recently in “letting go.”

For years, I’ve tried meditating to combat anxiety. I’ve used mantras and scriptures, apps and music to facilitate that state of near-trance when I enter a state of flow – where my mind stops chattering long enough for God to talk. For me, nothing has been more thought-clearing than the simple act of creating with yarn. There’s something almost magical about turning a single piece of string into a piece of fabric. Whether it’s a dish cloth or a fancy garment, the simple rhythm established by wooden needles passing one over the other creates a calm that I have yet to experience through any fancy application of technology. The creation of a garment or accessory is a bonus.

Yesterday I found myself part way through a knitting project. I have a tendency to buy yarn that appeals to me and then try to find the right project for it rather than choosing a project and then choosing the fiber. Sometimes I pick the wrong project. Yesterday I found myself looking at a piece of knitting that I started a couple of months ago and put aside because it just wasn’t working.. I’ve tried several times to love it and to finish it, but I couldn’t’ get to that place where my needles fly on their own without thinking. Every stitch was a struggle. It was one of those projects where the design was just wrong for the fiber.

I really wanted to love it, because I had at least 15 hours invested. The yarn was hand-dyed, purchased at a trunk show and cost a pretty penny, too. I looked at the work in progress, spent another hour or so knitting another couple of inches and finally accepted that I was never, ever going to love what I was making enough to finish it. I had a hard choice to make: I could stuff it into a bag and try to forget about the expense – both monetary and time that lived in that little bag…. or I could “frog it.”

I don’t know where the term “frogging” came from. Simply put, it means unraveling the fabric and recapturing the yarn or string. What had taken so many hours to create took only a few minutes to unmake.

I thought that I would feel a twinge of remorse at watching all of my work-time disappear, but I didn’t. At one point, I was left with a huge tangled mess when the stitches didn’t unwind evenly. I picked through the mass and pulled the knots apart one by one. After a long while, I was left with three balls of yarn that looked just like they did before I began the knitting with them in the first place.

I looked through my electronic gallery of patterns and one seemed to cry out, “make me with that beautiful yarn,” so I listened. My needles flew. I found the rhythm, and the world dropped away.

From time to time, I would look around the room from my knitting chair, and I spied possessions that no longer serve me. Some were broken or outdated. Others tied me to a place in the past. Like the “frogged” project, they no longer felt right. I took the broken things to the trash and the things that might be useful to someone else to the “donation” box. The ties to those objects unraveled much like the knitting. I encountered “knots” as I removed certain objects that had belonged to a beloved family member, but that I never loved for the sake of the object.

As humans, we long for continuity. We become attached to people, places and things. The concept of detaching from our possessions, relationships and even our ideas is painful. We hold onto things (ideas, belief, possession, and people) that harm us because we are afraid to trust our instincts – afraid to admit that what we are doing, keeping, and believing isn’t working.

No earthly thing is forever. so long as we live, we will be forced to say “goodbye” to people, places and things over and over. The more we are tangled up in the past, the harder it is to move into the future – to live the life where the design and the material work together.

Sometimes “frogging” means admitting that I hired someone that was wrong for the position I needed to fill. Sometimes it means realizing that I’m not the best person to handle a project because my skills just don’t match the needs of the client. Whatever you’re dumping bucket after bucket of your energy into, make sure that your going to have a result in the end that you can be proud of – or at the very least, one that won’t make you cringe every time you think of all of the time and expense that you put into it.

I wouldn’t be a very good Buddhist monk. Although I give away a lot of my finished projects, I admit that I become attached to some – those I keep. Others I donate. Some I give to people who I love. Others end up in the “frog pond” and are turned back into a ball of yarn waiting for just the right project to come along. There’s no shame in that.

I love it already!

Posted by BecomingBetty

There is a story about an old woman, recently widowed, who is moved to a nursing home. The woman is blind and cannot live independently. She waits, without family, in the lobby as her paperwork is completed and her room made ready. A staff member describes the room in great detail to her as she waits. “I love it already!” the old woman exclaims.

The nursing home staff member asks her, “How do you know you love it? You haven’t been inside it yet.”

The old woman, blind but wise, says, “The actual room and its furnishings has nothing to do with it. I’ve already decided that I love it. Happiness is a decision you make on purpose.”

I’m paraphrasing the story. I saw it originally on Facebook, and a google search showed that a similar story, but not quite the one that I remember was written by Joyce Meyer in “The Mind Connection: How the Thoughts You Choose Affect your Mood, Behavior and Decision.

It’s been some time since I wrote a blog post. To be honest, I’ve been feeling very sorry for myself. We discovered at the beginning of August that my 88 year old mother’s cancer had caused pathological fractures in her spine and right hip. She elected to have 10 radiation treatments to “beat it back” to alleviate the pain. Although I begged her to come stay with me for the duration of the treatments, she steadfastly refused to leave her home.

The treatments were harder than she expected. Due to the area that was being treated, there was a lot of irritation and inflammation in the digestive tract. She was frequently nauseated and vomiting, and there was nothing that I could do about it. Once the treatment started at the cancer center near her home, it couldn’t be transferred to the sister center near mine because of differences in equipment and dosages.

The day after her last treatment we received a call that she was gravely ill, and that management at her independent living community had determined that she was no longer independent enough to stay in her home. She was a danger to herself and potentially others. She had to leave, and I needed to be there when they broke the news to her.

I finished up some urgent matters at my office and drove south to Mom’s home. I packed up a handful of things in case I needed to stay overnight. When I arrived, Mom was sitting in her chair. Although we hadn’t spoken, she acted like she was expecting me. “I’ve decided to take you up on your offer to come stay with you. It will be a little vacation at your house – let’s see how it goes. I need some help.”

I was delighted that she had made the decision on her own. I knew that once she arrived at my home, she was unlikely to return to hr own, but we didn’t talk about that. I tried to get her to just get into the car so that I could help her (and so that my family could help me…) She refused. She needed to “clean the house,” and she couldn’t miss her doctor appointment in two days. I decided to stay with her for those two days.

To make a very long story very short, the doctor appointment never happened. Instead, my very sick mother slipped into a rapid decline and ended up spending the next two weeks in a series of moves that included two emergency rooms, three hospital rooms, two nursing home rooms and a bunch of procedure rooms.

I was with her night and day for more than a week that seemed like an eternity. Somewhere around day 4, my mom started to disappear. She changed from my loving mother to a scared, angry woman who told me that I was evil. She went from praising the staff to believing that they were possessed by Satan.

She was treated for electrolyte imbalances and a urinary tract infection. Each time they discovered a deficiency, I grasped onto hope that correcting it would bring my mother back. It didn’t.

She finally settled into a nursing home for rehabilitation. She was unable to do even the most basic self-care chores for herself.

I really, really wish that I could tell you that she is like the old woman in the beginning of this post and that she was determined to like her room before she even saw it. Instead, each time I would visit her in the nursing home, she would berate me. She would accuse me of tricking her into agreeing to stay with her so that I could put her into a nursing home where they torture her, make her fly on trapezes, tie her to the bed, punch her in the stomach, and leave her alone in the dining room for hours and hours without help. Gradually, I came to accept that the person that I love as my mother has rather suddenly disappeared.

One trip she told me that I am not her daughter anymore. Another time she told me that there are two of me. One is evil and one is her daughter, and she is not sure which one I am. She tells me that she wants to go home – but now she thinks that home is in Kidron, where we lived for many years, but she hasn’t lived there in a decade. Every visit, she asks me how her mom is – my grandma – who died when I was a little girl. Every visit, she tells me that she wishes that she had just died.

For two weeks at least, it seemed that everything made me cry. I stopped doing the things that I love to do. I stopped doing the things that help me to function – to stave off anxiety and depression. Instead, I cried. Sometimes I raged – I would scream in the car driving down the road when nobody could hear me. I have often told other caregivers “You cannot pour from an empty cup,” but when faced with the same sort of scenario in my own life, I poured and poured and poured until there was nothing left to give, and it still was not enough.

I would start projects – writing projects, crochet projects, cleaning projects -and then I would abandon them. My living room became filled with half-done afghans, dish cloths and hats.

One day a few weeks ago when I didn’t have court or client scheduled, I didn’t get out of bed until past 10:00 a.m. I’m an early riser. I get up, make coffee and then journal, meditate, and study. My husband knew then that something was very wrong.

We were blessed with a beautiful weekend in late September. My husband suggested a boat trip to an island. Reluctantly I agreed to leave – immediately. Instead of packing a large cooler full of food to prepare, we left with just our clothing and toiletries, a couple of packs of lunch meat, a loaf of bread, a bag of trail mix and another of potato chips, and elected to treat ourselves to a whole weekend of restaurants.

Although I used to run many miles each month, I had stopped doing that, too, over the course of the summer. There was a charity run scheduled for Saturday that weekend on the island, and I decided to register and do my best. I joined several hundred runners at the start line. There were several times that I had a hard time seeing the road because the tears were flowing so hard. I wasn’t in physical pain -it was a mental and spiritual battle. I crossed the finish line with tears streaming down my face. I started something, and I finished it. The 5k run didn’t become another unfinished project.

I wish that I could say that I snapped out of my funk and began living life again immediately after that 5k, but the truth is that it took another week of slowly beginning again to use the tools that helped me to function after the last crisis in our family.

Anyone who has followed me on Facebook or in my blogs for any period of time knows that I tend to post the happy things. My life is spent cultivating joy whenever possible. It’s easy to find joy in a flower when life is smooth sailing. Applying the tools is much more difficult when the waves are crashing and it seems that the world is burning down around you.

I’m learning that people can’t hurt our feelings. It’s our own thoughts about events that hurt us. It’s our own thoughts about life that bring us joy.

For those weeks in September, I spent all of my energy trying to find a solution for Mom’s mental decline. I spent hours combing my memory trying to find signs that the dementia was there all along and I just missed it. I spent hours trying to convince her that she’s in a place for help and that she still has a life to live if she just tries. that “project” took all of the time and attention from all of the other “projects” in my life. I finally realized that making myself miserable and allowing depression and anxiety creep back into my life – forgoing joy and happiness won’t bring my mother joy. It won’t bring her peace. It won’t make her want to live.

I choose life. Mom will be 89 in a few weeks. Whether or not she emerges from this event, her life is nearing its natural end. My visits always upset her. I no longer see her every day. It’s not good for her, and it’s really horrible for me. If she tells my kids that she wants something, I send it. I’ve stopped worrying so much about what other people think about the matter.

I’ve finished crocheting two cowls and I’m almost done with a poncho that I started at the beginning of summer. I ran again this week. I am back into my morning routine. I go to sleep giving thanks and I wake up anticipating a great day.

I am here to love my life, no matter what may come. It’s the only life I have, and I’m not about to waste it. This weekend I am setting up my office in a different room in the same building. I don’t know exactly what furnishing will fit or how they will look, but I love it already. I’m going to learn to knit on Thursday. I don’t know what I will make, but I love it already.

I don’t know what may come, but I’m certain that I can find beauty and comfort in it. I love it already!

This one’s for you

Posted by BecomingBetty

There was a time not so many years ago when I would write for the joy of writing. I would write stories and poems. I wrote term papers and articles. I enjoyed writing. I enjoyed sharing my writing. One day it came back to me through the grapevine that someone felt that my writing was “passive aggressive.” They felt that it was directed at I them. Maybe it was. I can’t tell you what was in my head at the time.

Writing was an outlet for my feelings. Feelings are not always right or wrong. Brooke Castillo (check out her podcast) says that the thoughts that we have about a circumstance cause our feelings. If that is correct, then we can change our feelings by changing our thoughts. That’s a lot harder than it sounds.

I get anxiety. I won’t say that I suffer from it (although I sometimes do), but the fact is that I experience anxiety is truth. I am feeling anxiety right now. I am anxious that this blog post isn’t eloquent or polished. I get anxious that people will think there’s something inferior about me because I admit that I have anxiety.

Anxiety has a physical quality. My tummy feels a little funny and it feels like someone is squeezing my voice box. Sometimes it feels like my heart is beating in my throat. Sometimes anxiety has an identifiable source. Other times, it’s just there.

My anxiety has a host of symptoms that accompany it. Sometimes I worry. I play a scenario out in my head and invent a dozen potential outcomes – some of them catastrophic. It’s rather like the movie “Groundhog Day.” Sometimes there aren’t conscious thoughts – just a feeling of impending doom.

I used to love to add to this blog. I allowed anxiety to take it away from me. I worried about what other people might think of me as a person or as a professional. I stopped writing.

Like other things in life, anxiety ebbs and flows. When anxiety reaches its high tide mark, I stop creating. It takes too much energy. There is nothing left for music or writing. I can get through the things that I have to do, but there isn’t energy left to create.

When my anxiety is high, I hope for an invitation to spend time with someone then make myself sick being anxious about it. If I can push through the anxiety, I nearly always have a great time. It’s getting there that is the problem.

I know some remarkable people who have anxiety. Over time, we learn ways of coping with it, or even harnessing it. I’m no expert on treating anxiety- or even coping with anxiety, but I have survived anxiety for at least 35 years, which qualifies me to say it can be done.

I’m constantly seeking and evaluating new approaches to dealing with anxiety. Some work better than others. My anxiety toolbox includes exercise, meditation and essential oils. Sometimes it has included medication and therapy.

May is mental health awareness month. Perhaps this post would have been more appropriate last month, but the truth is that admitting you have anxiety causes…(you guessed it…) more anxiety!

My hope is that there is someone out there who reads this who will say, “I am not alone.” I’m putting this blog out in the world unedited, flaws and all, to prove to myself that it’s okay to do C+ work once in a while. If you think this is for you, it probably is. Tell me what you think. We can talk about it. It would make me anxious…but I think I’d like it.

Day 6/365: Prayer and Meditation

Posted by BecomingBetty

I spend a period of time each day in prayer and in meditation. I set aside time each day for each of these practices. I am not a theologian or a guru. I have found, though, that prayer and meditation complement each other and add a great deal to my life.

I have heard it said that prayer is talking to God, and meditation is listening for the answers. That may be an oversimplification, but I like the sentiment.

The first thing I do in the morning, before I get out of bed, is to give thanks for another day of life. If my husband is in bed, I check if he is breathing and give thanks for that, too. I (silently) say “this is the day that the Lord has made, I will rejoice and be glad in it,” and then I wake up my 16-year-old son and round up the dogs.

I go to sleep at night (literally) counting my blessings and giving thanks for the many people and things that bring joy into my life. I don’t view God as a vending machine in the sky that doles out favors in exchange for prayer tokens. I don’t spend much prayer time asking for specific blessings. I do, however, seek answers. I ask for inspiration, and I receive it.

I attempt to spend 15 – 20 minutes each morning in meditation. I have some recordings that i like to use to get into a meditative state of mind. It seems my mind is always working on one question or another, and it is difficult to reach a place where I can just “be” instead of “doing.”

I have learned to keep a pad of paper and a pen handy when I meditate because ideas just pop into my mind. Without my mind planning projects or worrying about details, I am free to simply breathe in and out and listen for inspiration and answers – or just to relax and enjoy life.

There are many free meditation apps for iPhone and Android that are useful tools to help you learn to meditate. Although it’s cold in Ohio as I write (1 degrees F, brrrr), when the weather is warn, there is nothing that I enjoy more than sitting in nature with my eyes closed and just simply observing the sounds of nature and the sensations of the sun and the breeze as they touch my skin. In these moments I can truly disconnect from the wear and tear of life’s distractions and allow God to speak.

The $600 Washcloth

Posted by BecomingBetty

I like to crochet. It is a great way to occupy my hands in the evening when I watch television with my husband. It’s hard to eat popcorn when your hands are full of yarn. I am also a “gifter.” I love to give little gifts. I like to gift what I make, as well. For the past several years, I have crocheted warm scarves in the winter time. Most of my family members have (at least) one. I have at least 20 of them stacked on a shelf in case I need a gift for someone on short notice. They are great to make in the winter, but when the weather gets warm, I usually stop crocheting.

This year, I discovered cotton yarn. I’ve discovered the joy of making face cloths, scrubbies, and dish cloths. I love to make them in bright colors. They make me happy.

I can buy a perfectly nice washcloth at the store for $4.00. I can buy a deluxe washcloth for $10 – $15. I can buy a handmade washcloth just like the ones I am making on Etsy for under $10. Depending on the stitch, these washcloths take me 3-4 hours to make. The materials cost $1 – $2 depending on which brand of yarn I buy and whether or not it is on sale.

When I am making washcloths, I can’t earn money as a lawyer. I suppose, in that regard these pretty little pieces of hand-made fabric that will soon be stained with makeup or food are pretty expensive. However, I’m a believer in doing more of what makes me happy.

Crocheting washcloths is almost a form of meditation for me. I don’t have to think beyond the next stitch. The feel of the yarn and the rhythm are comforting. The bright colors are uplifting. There’s nothing about this little activity I don’t enjoy, and it’s cheaper than therapy.

As I mentioned before, I’m a gifter. If you find yourself the recipient of one or more of these $600 washcloths, you can be sure that I like you, and that I think you, too, deserve a $600 washcloth, and a whole lot more.

love,

~Be~

Comfort and Joy

Posted by BecomingBetty

Happy New Year! I’m quite late for a New Year post, I know, and believe me, that’s actually a good thing. You see, 2016 is the year when I make good on my promise to be good to myself.

“You cannot serve from an empty vessel.” – Eleanor Brownn

Historically, I have run in the new year and then spent hours poring over journal entries and blog posts from the previous year, decade, etc. to see where I’ve come from, and what track my life is taking. This year was different – the clock struck midnight and my husband and I shared a sparkling grape juice toast with our youngest son before heading upstairs – together – and falling peacefully asleep. There was no attempt to review the past – no tears shed at past hurts, and only one resolution: to be good to myself.

2016 is the year of comfort and joy. This is the year of self care and learning to say, “no,” when necessary. I’m taking time (and making time) to do the things that bring me joy. I’m allowing myself to enjoy the things that bring me comfort.

This is the year of silly songs at the break of dawn, loose leaf tea in fancy teacups, essential oils that smell like liquid joy or comfort in a bottle, and beautiful fibers that wind themselves into scarves and blankets while my eyes watch the television.

Thanks to the efforts of my husband and children, I once again have a “sacred space,” (named the Betty Room by my hubby) where I can sit quietly to read, pray, meditate, and contemplate. I’m also getting a new bathtub with enough depth to soak – more comfort (and some joy, too).

My first bit of advice for 2016 is to make room for comfort and joy in your own life. Experiences that comfort us and that allow us to feel joyful replenish the energy that we deplete when we give. Although giving to others without expectation of receiving anything in return brings its own rewards, when people take from us without giving, over and over, it can take a spiritual and physical toll. Seek out joy. Seek out comfort. Make your own happiness, and then share from that vessel that is no longer empty.

“Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over.” – Psalm 23:5

We can pray for comfort and joy, or we can seek it out. I had a difficult Monday with a difficult adversary in a difficult proceeding at work. It was bitterly cold, and when I stopped my car for gasoline, I opened my back door to retrieve a hat. When I went to shut the door, it would not latch. Believing it to be frozen, I took it to a local auto repair place hoping they could quickly thaw it so that I could be on my way to a court proceeding. It turned out to be a broken latch, not a frozen one, and replacement parts had to be ordered. There was no way to fasten the door shut (except, possibly the rope and duct tape that my cousin suggested) for the 45 mile drive, so I had to beg for mercy from the party with all of the power in that situation. The tone for the tense email exchange that followed was probably largely imaginary. The tone of the voice in my head as I read the email response was set by the morning I had already had.

I wouldn’t go nearly so far as call that person an enemy, but it nevertheless the terse nature of the exchange (real or imagined) created a drain on my joy. I set my little table with one of my favorite teacups as I brewed a fragrant pot of tea. I rubbed a few drops of my favorite essential oil blends on my temples, and I allowed the aromas from the tea and the oil to surround me with beauty, comfort and joy. That’s probably not what the Psalmist had in mind, but soon I was singing again.

My husband said, “boy, you’re in a good mood!” I explained my quest for comfort and joy. Sometimes you have to “fake it until you make it.” When you’re faking joy, though, it quickly becomes real as it infects others with smiles (or even laughs).

I’ve had a tough week so far, but my cup runneth over. Being good to myself is my only resolution for 2016. Actively seeking comfort and joy is the first step toward achieving success.

Happy 2016.

~Be~

Count your Blessings

Posted by BecomingBetty

Prayer and meditation are important to me. I’ll admit, though, that I am easily distracted. I start praying and the dog barks or the neighbors’ kids laugh, and I’m instantly thinking about something else. I’m one of those people who need tools to focus.

I began a new routine today, one that I hope to stick to. I began by writing in my journal – the one saved for positive thoughts and positive memories. This act of recognizing peace, beauty and blessings in my life helped to get me into the proper mindset for part two, which was literally counting my blessings.

Some time ago I purchased a Mala, which is traditionally a Hindu or Buddhist tool for meditation. I purchased it for its beauty, and it resides in my special space. Today I picked up that Mala and tried it as a tool to focus for my prayer practice. Holding the tassel, I began my prayer by thanking God for the many blessings in my life, including my family and my improved health. I asked God to bless the people in my life and asked that as I said each name, that He would bless that person with joy, hope, peace and health, and to bring into their life anything that they needed.

There are 108 smaller beads on the mala. As the string of beads slipped through my fingers one at a time, the names of 108 people in my life came to me, one after another. 108 blessings. I know about the struggles in some of their lives, and as those names came to me, I prayed for those situations. Others I simply prayed that their lives would be filled with the blessings that they bring into my life.

I had no mental “prayer list.” The names and faces came into my mind one after another. I was somewhat surprised by some of the names that came to mind. Some were people who had hurt me, and along with praying for blessings for them, I prayed for help to forgive long-ago hurts.

108 people, 108 prayers, 108 blessings. As I closed my prayer, I thanked God for such a rich life. I thought it would be hard to come up with 108 people to pray for, but as I write this, the names and faces keep coming.

My life is blessed – truly blessed.