I led a retreat this past week end at the Hazelden Renewal Center in MN. Â The topic was Cultivating Hope In All Our Affairs. Â Twenty-eight of us gathered and gently moved forward in our thinking, our personal explorations, our willingness to be intimately vulnerable and open to the vulnerabilities of others. Â It was miraculous, really. Â I have discovered that these kinds of week ends are always miraculous, in fact, because perceptions become changed. Â You can see it happening. Â You can feel the shift occurring. Â And you can see the body language relaxing, a[...]
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Reflections in the Mirror – You and Yourself
4 The success of our relationships often depends on our willingness to detach from the behavior of others. Â How often have we thought, "If only he or she would . . . " Â I spent many years quite certain that if others would only change, I'd be happy, free from anxiety, content that the future would be all that I deserved. Â Try as I did, I was not successful in getting others to change. Â Nor did I even understand the concept of detachment. Â And now I am relieved that I am no longer held hostage by such folly. The burden of trying to be in control of the uncontr[...]
Get a small notebook that you carry with you everywhere and be ready to use it. Begin noting how others on your path demonstrate their hope. Do this for a month. Imitate them, in fact. Keep track of the times you extended love/hope to some one else over a seven day period. Note what effect this extension has on you. Practicing gratitude cultivates hope and a changed heart. At the end of each day for thirty days, write about your experiences. What changes in yourself do you see? List the times you know, without a doubt, that God was present in your li[...]
1. Look carefully at all the people you interact with over the next few days. Take a moment at the end of each day and write down some reasons you think certain people crossed your path. 2. The people who trigger anger in us are teaching us the most, some would say. If this is true, what have you recently learned and how has your world view changed? 3. Some one who disagrees with you is giving you an opportunity to broaden your mind or make the choice to remain quiet. Have you experienced either response recently? Write in your journal how it felt.[...]
My first You Tube is now available on Google, thanks to a very good friend.  We always second guess ourselves, don't we.  My first reaction was surprise; my next reaction was: My hair looks awful!  And then I had to strain to hear it.  Obviously the volume was turned down on my computer, and I didn't  realize it.  All things to be improved upon in the next attempt. As we have all been told so many times, practice results in progress and I intend to make progress.  Just doing it feels  like a major achievement, however.  Adding this to the many new things[...]
Being focused on any one else will prevent us from doing the work we are here to do. It’s far too easy to sit in judgment of others, to criticize them silently or audibly. It has become important to me to remember that every person alive has a very specific jour- ney, one that will intersect mine on occasion; sometimes we will be at cross-purposes, in fact. But the intersection is where the lesson lies for both people. Every one’s activities, and we all have a legion of them, are filled with purpose. And if we are wondering about the purpose of some oneâ[...]