Cowgirl Interlude - Literature: The God, Its Ritual

Literature: The God, Its Ritual
Merrill Moore

Something strange I do not comprehend
Is this: I start to write a certain verse
But by the time that I come to its end
Another has been written that is worse
Or possibly better than the one I meant
And certainly not the same, and different.

I cannot understand it–I begin
A poem and then it changes as I write,
Never have I written the one I thought I might,
Never gone out the door that I came in,
Until I am perplexed by this perverse
Manner and behavior in my verse.

I’ve never written the poem that I intended;
The poem was always different when it ended.

*****

*giggle*

I learned this poem in high school. Same time I learned the next one.

Ann

*****

your poem, man
edward lueders

unless there’s one thing seen
suddenly against another–a parsnip
sprouting for a President, or
hailstones melting in an ashtray–
nothing really happens. It takes
surprise and wild connections,
doesn’t it? A walrus chewing
on a ballpoint pen. Two blue tail-
lights on Tyrannosaurus Rex. Green
cheese teeth. Maybe what we wanted
least. Or most. Some unexpected
pleats. Words that never knew
each other till right now. Plug us
into the wrong socket and see
what blows–or what lights up.
Try
untried
circuitry,
new
fuses.
Tell it like it never really was,
man,
and maybe we can see it
like it is.

* Thank you to the author of
http://www.wordplayground.com/other_authors.php
where I found both of these little ditties!

Side-Effects of Clarity

My friend, Steven, says that “Success is a side-effect of clarity.”

He’s right, you know. 

Anywhere I am not experiencing “success” (and what does that mean anyway? When am I not a success?  Ever?) I can rest assured that I have some corresponding lies, stresses, foggy thinking or misperceptions of reality.

I noticed that I haven’t written a blog yet this month and it’s the last day of the month. 

Why is that?  Well, I haven’t had a lot to say.

There are no dramas, issues, concerns, or opinions that I just had to put fingers to keyboard over. It’s not that I’ve lost the desire to write, or at least I don’t think I have. It’s just that I haven’t had so much to say.

Also, I look back at what I’ve written, and while it isn’t terrible, I have a clearer perspective Now on a lot of it than I did Then.

I was reading a book last week and the author mentioned a similar thing. He said that by the time he got his words onto paper, he had already gone deeper or found something truer. Something like that, yes. That’s what it seems like.

So, do I continue writing and just let it get truer and not worry about my misimpressions of the past?

Probably. It’s a blog, after all. Authors evolve.

Love, Ann

Yes, But I’m Different . . .

Two sentences out of my email last night to a friend:

I THOUGHT I WAS DIFFERENT.  OH. MY. FUCKING. GOD.

I’m not even bothering to censor that. I typed it as you see it - all caps and everything.

Since April, I have been experiencing a cascade of revelations, an internal psychological Flood of Biblical proportions.

Christian analogies aside, I thought I was living in a world, a body, a mind that was a certain way, did certain things, did not do certain other things, and was, on the whole, rather unique and different from all other worlds, bodies and minds - not only different from those I know, but different from all that ever lived or ever will live.

WRONG.

Let me say that again:  WRONG.

Now let me get personal: I WAS SO WRONG.

It started when I did that piece of The Work on “work” with Steven that I blogged about. That somehow reminded me of a sentence stem we often use for The Work:  “I’m a person who . . . (fill in the blank)” I started questioning all the “I’m a person who . . . ” sentences I noticed. 

You know the ones: 

I’m a person who makes X amount of money, does X type of work, likes coffee-flavored ice cream, and hates green peppers. Yeah, any and all of them. They are all fodder for self-revelation. Try it. You’ll like it. At least, the results of the inquiry are likely to be quite freeing. And isn’t that what we were after?

I realized that if life is a school, I was (from some perspectives) flunking some basic courses (you know - money, relationships, career - little things.) If life is a game, I was losing. If life is a play, I had a tragedy. And that NONE of that was necessary.

In fact, I have had the answers to the tests; the rulebook & the moves; the script and the score, for over 20 years now. It is no secret. (It’s not even “the” Secret.)

But I was different.  Those didn’t apply to me. 

You may be thinking the same thing about what I just wrote. I can’t stop you. But read on. Ask some questions. See what you find.

Why is it that we still have things we call “problems” or “issues” or “patterns” or . . . anything we go to therapists and self-help books and ministers and religious texts and weekend - even week-long and longer - seminars to try to “fix?”

Why?

Why, when people give us answers, even answers they say worked for them, do we not “solve” the “problem” and get on with laying in hammocks and smelling roses and enjoying the Darjeeling?

Okay, I’ll admit there is more than one correct answer to the question. In fact, it will probably take at least 3 answers to get a fuller picture. I’ll tell you what they are:

1.  The people we paid for “answers” were wrong about what actually worked.

2.  “Problems” are a feature not a bug.

3.  We . . . I don’t know how to tell you this . . . we, each of us, is no different from anyone else - at least not in any way that would prevent us from “solving” “problems.”

I know. It’s a hard pill to swallow. It makes no sense at first.

There’s just one tiny little - majorly important - fact - about this:  it’s true.

So, let’s look at the first answer: the people we paid for answers are also . . . wrong.

Because memory is reconstructed from fragments, not saved en toto like a video, but with many additions, deletions and distortions - nothing is as we recall it - not even the well-intentioned interpretations of those who want to teach us how to “solve” a “problem.”

Daniel Gilbert’s book, Stumbling on Happiness, contains explanations and more, with pages and pages of footnotes documenting the research. I just finished reading it, and none too soon! Get one.  There are 130 used copies on Amazon starting at $4.50. With shipping, it costs less than a lot of us will spend on lunch today (another topic I’ve been questioning - my “latte factor” see David Bach’s book Smart Couples Finish Rich, but I digress.)

The point is - because of the way our minds work when looking at the past to see what “worked,” we will invariably misunderstand and reconstruct it in some way it ain’t never been. Then, because we may have had some success since then, and because we have a charismatic personality (or a good agent) we get to sell books & seminars and go on Oprah to tell everyone what we mis-remember that didn’t actually work.

When it doesn’t work for everyone, we tell them they didn’t hold their mouths right - that ain’t it.

According to the research in Gilbert’s book, the only time we can get reliable data from someone about what is making them happy is in the middle of the experience. He says that we can, and should, use this as a guide for our choices, but only if we want to have the most reliable answers possible. Otherwise, we can continue to count on mis-remembered and mis-reported and misunderstood memories from those who are trying to sell us something.

The second correct answer is a variation on the “That’s not a bug; it’s a feature” wisdom from computer geekdom.

Problems:  Bug or feature?

Well, we all have them. They are built-in. We have them regularly. They don’t stop. Even those who have achieved what we think we want have had them - in abundance!

So.  Bug or feature? 

Feature.

Definitely.

Get used to it.

If these ideas intrigue you at all, if you’ve ever spent a dime to solve some personal issue - then spend these dimes to see what Gilbert says would actually work. And there is always the libarary. 

I’ll bet you still won’t do it. Why? 

Well, let me tell you:

This is the kicker, yet another truth that set me free, another answer I didn’t want to hear, another perspective that might have saved me 3 decades of ignorance, that I was finally suddenly able to accept after Gilbert’s book and Sashen’s classes and the Conspiracy of the Universe led me, as they say, “kicking and screaming into my bliss”

I AM NO DIFFERENT FROM ANYONE ELSE

- not in any way that matters when I want to know how to be happy.

I breathe air.

I eat food.

I walk on 2 legs, have one head, 2 arms, 10 toes, 10 fingers, keep going . . .

I laugh. I cry. I shit. I die.

I want what everyone else wants, and I get it the same way anyone else would.

Considering the landscape of human experience, and I mean the WHOLE landscape, the basics of being human, the things I have held tightly to, the things that kept me so blind, are the tiniest fraction of my entire reality as a human being.

Mostly, I am just like you.

And as I wrote to the Right Reverend Doctor Mr. Sashen last night (really, someone should give this man an honorary doctorate - in life):

I am humbled & amazed.

I’m so in love with the whole thing that I can hardly contain myself.

I’m sitting here with tears in my eyes again.

Love, Ann

PS - I was looking for a closing quote and I found a great review of Gilbert’s book with an interview:

                   http://www.powells.com/authors/danielgilbert.html

Oh, and here’s a quote, from Daniel Gilbert in the above link:

“I can guarantee you that half the things in Stumbling on Happiness will turn out to be false. The beauty of science is that we just keep stumbling along, slowly accumulating facts that we can rely on. I’m talking about a lot of very new research. A lot of it is mine. There may be fifteen or twenty scientists working on related problems, and I’ve talked about their work, but until we have decades of research on this, with hundreds if not thousands of scientists working on the same problem, we won’t know which parts are right and which are wrong.”

                                                          - Daniel Gilbert

 

Truth is Erotic - The Ultimate Shampoo Method

Truth is erotic.

It is.

I just spent a whole weekend with people who were asking each other and ourselves “Is it true?” all weekend long and I’ve been turned on all weekend.

Why would anyone think otherwise? There are people who think it’s erotic to lie or to cheat.

Well, it’s that same thing of having the horse before the cart.

Step One:  We do something “naughty” or we lie or cheat or get away with something.

Step Two:  We get a feeling, generally in our solar plexus, stomach or throat.

Step Three: We misidentify that feeling. We use it as “proof” that something hurts or we mistake it for excitement or a turn-on when it is anything but.

Step Four:  We take that dirty feeling and pete and repeat.

Try interjecting a question when you get that feeling, “Is it true?” and sit with it. Notice what comes up.

Then, just for fun, go a little further, “Is it absolutely true?”  No points for no or yes. Just check.

If you find you’ve been lying, try the truth. See what you discover. Does it feel at least as good as the lie?

As always, lather, rinse, repeat.

I found so many of the people in this workshop attractive, and even more so by the end of the weekend. The more we shared the truth with each other, and got real, the more I enjoyed being with them. Some more than others, some not at all at first, but by the end of the weekend, I had about 20 new lovers in a certain sense. I loved the way each of us stepped out from behind our walls and were willing to be seen and to see.

One woman told me (now, mind you, I was wearing a simple green short-sleeved top, an ahnk, large hoop earrings and black yoga pants) told me that I seemed very medieval. She touched me. How did she see that? The next day I let it show in my dress, wearing a cream peasant blouse, a rust colored sash and peacock earrings.

I loved that. We just went freer and freer all weekend. Or deeper. Or more blissed.

On the last exercise I was laughing hysterically. I couldn’t find any separation between the three things we were comparing (with the story, without the story and beyond stories.)

I loved the sharing of it. 

Love, Ann

“No one has ever heard a word I said.”

                        - Byron Katie

 

Cowgirl Interlude: Songs about Ann

I was browsing for the meaning of my name and came across this:

I know 3 of the bands (Flogging Molly, The Who & Buddy Holly) and none of the songs.

Songs about Anne

• Anne Neggan - Budgie
• Carrie Anne - The Hollies
• Charlotte Anne - Julian Cope
• Leslie Anne Levine - The Decemberists
• Mary Anne - Marshall Crenshaw
• Mary Anne with the Shaky Hand - The Who
• Queen Anne’s Revenge - Flogging Molly
• Stacie Anne - The Fratellis

I’ll have to look into these, find them on iTunes or something.

The one I have always identified with is “Annie’s Song” by John Denver.

Love, Ann

 

Silly Question & Silly Answer - Email with a Former Lover

Recently, Jean wrote that she missed me.

I wrote back asking what about me she missed. I titled it “Silly Question,” because I wasn’t sure she’d even know and wondering why I was pursuing it, anyway, as we’ve been estranged for some years over some things I said during our break-up that caused her some trouble with child custody arrangements later.  What I said was true, but it was neither kind nor necessary and an apology wasn’t going to take back the consequences.

Here is my first email:

There may not be a way for you to answer this, but for some reason, the past couple of days, I’ve been wondering:
 
You have said a couple of times that you miss me.
 
What is it that you miss about me? 
 
Maybe there’s a way to have/share that without threatening your security about confidentiality and Stuff?

She replied:

Not a silly question.
 
With the exception of the times I find you either bitchy or inappropriate, I miss your company.  In addition to being a think first, dynamic Priest, I often experience you to be bright, thoughtful, interesting, and stimulating.
 
You’d think these things wouldn’t be hard to find, but sadly, I find that they are.
 
Hope this helps.

Jean

So, I tried this:

How can I share those things with you without threatening the safety & security of your confidentiality concerns?
 
Email comes to mind. Just a thought.
 
Love, Ann

Jean wrote:

You can to some extent, but probably not very deeply, as I have learned that I can’t ever trust you to not turn against me if you are hurt and/or I cannot trust in your judgement of what constitutes inappropriate behaviour.
 
On the surface, it can be fine, but I always need to watch myself, protect myself, be on guard.
 
That’s why I am angry and sad.  IMO, your behaviour cost us our friendship.

Jean<

So, stepping totally out of my business and into hers, I sent:

Jean, when you learn how not to place the cause of your happiness or unhappiness outside of yourself - no matter what - well, if you ever do, we’ll see what happens.

There isn’t a single true sentence in your email.

That’s not an attack. It is the kindest thing I could possibly tell you. Knowing that, in anything, would instantly, infinitely and permanently change your life in every way you ever dreamed of wanting and more.

I know me. I’ll continue to check in sometimes, see how you’re doing, whether you’ve . . . there’s a Hitchhiker’s Guide quote for the moment.  Arthur Dent is lying in front of the bulldozer in Act I, Scene I, and Mr. Prosser the foreman, asks Ford Prefect, “Has Mr. Dent come to his senses?”  Ford replies, “Can we assume, for the moment, that he has not? And that he’s going to be lying in front of this tractor all day?”

Nevermind, that may not be funny to you for lack of HHGG familiarity and the other stuff.

I’m not saying what I did was right. I am only saying that it’s over. The same way I do regarding my father. That situation ended completely and forever in 1975.  To continue to beat myself up with it, would only hurt myself. Therefore, Daddy and I have a fine relationship. I generally don’t bring the past into it. He apologized. He never did it again. Those events are over and done with, forgiven, even when I experience things that seem to be the effects of that.  I now know that these are really only the effects of my thinking.

Mind you he didn’t change, either. I know who he is and I love him like that.

Notice the truth and lies disappear.

Alright, enough typing. I’m going to post this on the blog.

Don’t worry - I’ll use a pseudonym there.

Did you know that part of the way people are able to write memoir in our country without being sued is that truth is a defense in a court of law? Stories about events have many sides, as evidenced by eye-witness accounts, just minutes after the fact, of any newsworthy event that has ever occured.

I miss you, too. I am reluctant to stop typing because I may not have occasion again for a while.

Love, Ann

I miss her sometimes, too.  She’s right where she always was, though, in my thoughts.

Katie says, “No two people have ever met.”

Happy Towel Day!

Douglas Adams’ books in “increasingly misnamed” Hitchhiker’s Guide trilogy helped me to laugh, keep my perspective and get through some years when I used to think I was depressed, sad, lonely, not getting what I want, etc. I can quote it up one wall and down the other. 

There is a HHGG quote for every occasion.  (I have a friend who says there is a Ghostbuster’s quote for every occasion. He’s right. Same for Mel Brooks movies, Monty Python, and more. I just happen to have latched onto Hitchhiker’s Guide.)

Today, boys and girls, today is towel day. I will be carrying mine.

So, without further delay, let me share this with you from  http://www.towelday.kojv.net/

You sass that hoopy Douglas Adams? Now there’s a frood who knew where his towel was. You are invited to join your fellow hitch hikers in mourning the loss of the late great one. Join in on towel day to show
your appreciation for the humor and insight that Douglas Adams brought to all our lives.

What do I do?

Carry your towel with you throughout the day to show your participation and mourning.

When do I do it?

May 25th.

Where do I do it?

Everywhere.

Why a towel?

To quote from The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.

A towel, it says, is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitch hiker can have. Partly it has great practical value - you can wrap it around you for warmth as you bound across the cold
moons of Jaglan Beta; you can lie on it on the brilliant marble-sanded beaches of Santraginus V, inhaling the heady sea vapours; you can sleep under it beneath the stars which shine so redly on the desert world of
Kakrafoon; use it to sail a mini raft down the slow heavy river Moth; wet it for use in hand-to-hand-combat; wrap it round your head to ward off noxious fumes or to avoid the gaze of the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast
of Traal (a mindboggingly stupid animal, it assumes that if you can’t see it, it can’t see you - daft as a bush, but very, very ravenous); you can wave your towel in emergencies as a distress signal, and of
course dry yourself off with it if it still seems to be clean enough.

More importantly, a towel has immense psychological value. For some reason, if a strag (strag: non-hitch hiker) discovers that a hitchhiker has his towel with him, he will automatically assume that he is
also in possession of a toothbrush, face flannel, soap, tin of biscuits, flask, compass, map, ball of string, gnat spray, wet weather gear, space suit etc., etc. Furthermore, the strag will then happily
lend the hitch hiker any of these or a dozen other items that the hitchhiker might accidentally have “lost”. What the strag will think is that any man who can hitch the length and breadth of the galaxy, rough it,
slum it, struggle against terrible odds, win through, and still knows where his towel is is clearly a man to be reckoned with.”

 

Adrenaline or Peace ? You Pick

This morning I got an email from someone in my brunch group. It was long, but at the center of it was something like this:

“I’m writing a personal note to you to share something with you that I believe could significantly add to the richness of your already amazing life. A few months ago I became involved with HUB- Humanity Unites Brilliance. HUB is where we connect to change the world. HUB is an opportunity to live your life’s purpose AND create sustained abundance for you personally or for your non-profit. I believe it’s a huge opportunity!
 
I’m writing to invite you to join me for 5 days in Long Beach, CA, June 18-22, for an experience you won’t forget! The cost for the event is $2500 per person, but it is FREE TO YOU.  I get to take 3 people for FREE, and I’d like you to be one the three on my personal list. If you’re interested please let me know ASAP (first come, first serve) so that I can save a space for you, as I know these free passes will go soon! The 5 days will be filled with great inspiration from top business leaders, social change artists, and empowerment coaches, in-depth education from some of the most brilliant minds in the world, and a sense of community like I’ve never experienced anywhere else. “

Oh really?  Well, I did her the courtesy of replying:

Dear Tooth Fairy,

I can see you’re all full of  . . . may I be honest?  Adrenaline about this.
 
I used to read things like this and think “Oh, this could be it! This could be how I (fill in the blank).   No, take that out of parenthesis. I thought it was how I could fill in the “blanks” I thought I saw in my life.
 
I’ve since learned that I was mistakenly equating these adrenaline highs with truth or some kind of guidance. And I learned this from my own experiences, as well as from listening to the seed-thoughts of Steven Sashen’s blogs.
 
Let me counter your invitation with another one. OK?
 
As you go through this process you are in, just ask yourself a couple of questions when you think of it.
 
1.  Is this peaceful or stressful?  (and go for truly peaceful - not excited, not jazzed, not OMG this is fabulous - peaceful)
 
2.  Whose business am I in?  (God’s, someone else’s, or mine)  with a potential sub-question, when I’m over there in their business, who’s taking care of my business?
 
 
I’m sure HUB is a fine organization with good intentions. And it’s not for me.
 
Here is a second invitation for you.
 
Read some of Steven’s Anti-Guru Blog.  I know you are packing your time with so much excitement (for me that reads “stress”) that you may feel you have no time, and what you do is entirely up to you.
 
But I’ll give you a link to one that might really apply and you can look at some of the other jewels in there if you want. They are both offerings of new words for our dictionary:
 
 
http://sashen.com/blog/49/manifrustration/
 
 
http://sashen.com/blog/51/hoping-to-be-a-successhole/
 
 
http://sashen.com/blog/
 
 
I wish you all the best.  Hope to see you at brunch when this wears off. You’re a truly wonderful individual.
 
Love, Ann

Crazy Busy? (Shampoo Method - Zooming in on Peace)

Why is it that whenever I try to schedule tea with my New-Agey friends, they all say the same thing?

“I’m just crazy busy.”  or “I can’t schedule that far in advance.”

Now, barring any halitosis or offensive personal attributes on my part, surely these people, all of whom claim to be “on a spiritual path,” can manage their time and schedules?

I think they are really feeling that overwhelmed.

Why?

For a while, I used the signature quote, “When God created time He made enough of it” which is apparently a Celtic saying.

Maybe they were too busy to notice or comment on it.

After they tell me they don’t have time to relax and get together, they start telling me how they’re taking new vitamins and scheduling hypnosis sessions and starting a new exercise regime to handle their stress. In other words, they’re busy trying to “fix” themselves.

I don’t get it. Aren’t we meditating? Didn’t we do our “Yoga for Relaxation?” Or chant our mantra today?

Okay, maybe all those things don’t deliver the “peace that passesth understanding,” as promised. Oopsie! And none of them have any effect at all if we stash the CD’s in a corner and never use them.

Maybe we are NOT BROKEN!!! What could we do with all the free time we would have (not to mention money) if we weren’t so busy trying to “fix” ourselves?

I realized as I was writing this that if I am not careful, this will turn into another one of my posts promoting “The Shampoo Methods”  (see the sidebar on the right) and the “IAM Meditations” http://www.advancedmeditation.com/cmd.php?af=570391

Look at those, if you wish, but whatever you do, stop a minute. Yes, right now.

Check inside.

Are you feeling peaceful?

I don’t care if you run around at a faster pace than others around you. That’s just Pacing (see Compatibility Factors on the right).  I’m just asking if you’re feeling peaceful or stressed out?

Do you have time for the things you want to do?

Or are you running around like a head with your chicken cut off just like all those “corporate America” types we like to bash for “not being spiritual?”

Check.

“Zooming in on Peace” might be an interesting thing to do.

Can you find one place in your body that is peaceful right now?

Just one - a small place will do. Could be your little toe or the back of your hand or your ear.

Now, “zoom in” on that peaceful place, as if you were looking at it through a microscope. Magnify it.

You might end up a little blissed-out sometimes when you do this.

Zoom in on it some more. Keep repeating this for a while.

Shampoo Method - Lather, rinse, repeat!

Keep doing that until . . . well, until you’re done.

And when you finish that, if you feel like it, call me and we’ll make a date for tea!

Love, Ann

“Peace in our minds and in our lives is a cause-effect relationship.”

 

 

“And Crawling on the Planet’s Face . . .”

” . . .  some insects, called the human race, lost in time, lost in space…and meaning.”

Do you recognize this quote?

It’s from Rocky Horror Picture Show, circa 1975.

Why would I open an Earth Day blog with that quote?

Because I wonder about things like Earth Day and environmentalism.

My Mother taught me to question things, even things she told me and things she believes. And believe me, my Mother is an environmentalist type who believes in “Reduce, Reuse, Recycle!” She started a recycling program at her church when she discovered they had none. I was writing letters to the editor of our city newspaper when I was a child, pointing out green goo in the river and wondering when they were going to clean that up. They did, too, and it gave me quite a sense of my ability to help and improve things.

But now I’m asking, “What if?” again.

What if the temperature fluctuations of the planet that we’ve only been recording for a few decades are normal?

What if cars and industrial pollution have nothing to do with the disappearance of the ozone layer? Or the melting of the polar ice caps?

What if all of this stress is only that - something else to stress about and beat ourselves up with?

I sent my mother a note about the piles of paper documentation generated in an office my friend, Angela, is working in. Angela said they would stack up as high as a tree. Mother replied, “Idiots!”

Instead of nodding my head in automatic agreement, I tilted my head and wondered, “Is that true?”

I mean, isn’t it a given that planets have a finite life, just like human beings? They don’t last forever. Nor do I think they should, necessarily. After doing the IAM Meditation, “Zooming in on Death,” you may see why I question this fear and avoidance of death.

Is there maybe a reason to suspect that we are simply, as Steven Sashen once put it, “An ant farm with thoughts?”

I mean, what do we do?

Katie says, “We sit, stand or lie horizontal.” That’s about it.

Steven, in a similar vein, says something along the lines of:  once we have a place to sleep, something to eat and someone to sleep with, that’s pretty much it.

Haven’t you noticed?

The rest is stories.

Maybe we have an exaggerated sense of our own importance on the planet?

I’m not saying we are not important, but isn’t it this sense of self-importance, “crown of creation,” latest-and-greatest in the evolutionary lineage that has something to do with the arrogance with which we make choices about our resources in the first place?

Could it be that supposing we are the cause of all the environmental shifts and changes in the world is part of the problem? Not part of the solution?

What would it take for us to have a little humility? Where could that lead us?

For Earth Day, I suggest we all take out a sheet of paper, perhaps a “Judge Your Neighbor” Worksheet (see the right-hand column or www.thework.com.) On that sheet of paper, make a list of all of your thoughts both “good” and “bad” about the environment, the Earth, your place on it, your responsibility for the environment, etc. and ask the Four Questions, then write the Turn Arounds.

1.  Is it true?

2.  Can I absolutely know it is true?

3.  How do I live or react when I believe this thought?

4.  Who would I be without this thought?

Turn it Around. (To self, other or an opposite)

Try it.  See what happens.

When you get to Question #3 about reactions and how you live, stop to wonder: is this thought peaceful or stressful? And be sure it is really peaceful before you say so.

Could it be that it’s really excitment or an adrenaline rush that you are calling peace? Peace is a calm thing, not a rush to go out and save the planet. I don’t know what you’re feeling. Just check.

I’d love to read your comments when you’re done.

So . . . in honor of my Mother, that’s my Earth Day blog.

Will you ask those 4 questions with me?

Love, Ann