Trying to Make Sense of It All

It’s difficult to try to put things into perspective with all that has happened with the pandemic. I remember back to March 12th, our last day with students at school, heading for a four day weekend. There was no indication that we were headed for what has transpired since that point. As far as we knew, COVID-19 was something in the news, but nothing that we needed to be overly concerned about.

Over the next several days, that certainly changed, and very quickly. We received word that school would not be back in session the following week and that learning packets must be prepared to send home to students. That all seems so long ago. The learning packets were sent out and many have been returned. Teachers have been using online tools to further learning and those students who are able and willing to take advantage of it, additional learning has been realized.

*Note – I started writing this two days ago and never finished it…thought I would go ahead and publish what I had written…still trying to make sense of it all in a situation where not much makes sense.

David Lee

Daily Readings for Thursday, April 30th

Balance

The goal is balance.

We need balance between work and play. We need balance between giving and receiving. We need balance in thought and feelings. We need balance in caring for our physical self and our spiritual self.

A balanced life has harmony between a professional life and a personal life. There may be times when we need to climb mountains at work. There may be times when we put extra energy into our relationships. But the overall picture needs to balance.

Just as a balanced nutritional diet takes into account the realm of our nutritional needs to stay healthy, a balanced life takes into account all our needs: our need for friends, work, love, family, play, private time, recovery time, and spiritual time – time with God. If we get out of balance, our inner voice will tell us. We need to listen.

Today, I will examine my life to see if the scales have swung too far in any area or not far enough in some. I will work toward achieving balance.

From The Language of Letting Go by Melody Beattie

Meditation for the Day

Each one of us is a child of God, and as such, we are full of the promise of spiritual growth. A young person is like the springtime of the year. The full time of the fruit is not yet, but there is promise of the blossom. There is a spark of the Divine in every one of us. Each has some of God’s spirit that can be developed by spiritual exercise. Know that your life is full of glad promise. Such blessings can be yours, such joys, such wonders, as long as you develop in the sunshine of God’s love.

Prayer for the Day

I pray that I may develop the divine spark within me. I pray that by so doing I may fulfill the promise of a more abundant life.

From Twenty-Four Hours a Day

Unusual Occurrences and Such

There are times in life when I’m more aware of things going on that are unusual or odd. Yesterday was one of those days. I had two examples of events occurring that caused me to pause and wonder what that was all about.

The first is a twist of good fortune. I have had problems with the belt on the deck of my riding mower slipping off its tracks. Two weeks ago when I mowed, the belt came off midway through mowing and I couldn’t figure out for the life of me how to re-thread it. I got the push mower out and finished the second half of the yard using it.

So yesterday, I felt some pressure seeing my neighbor mowing his yard, so I used the internet to find the threading diagram and then went out to see if I could get it done correctly, which I did. I mowed all the yard this time without it slipping off and all was well with the world. That is, until I hit something and noticed the blades had quit turning. This time the belt had snapped in two. But I’m looking at this as a positive event, for at least I got the job mostly done before it happened. And I’ve already ordered a new belt online that will be delivered to my home. Good deal.

The second event is a bit more unusual than the first and I haven’t quite decided if it’s a good thing or not. I turned in for the night and as I usually do, I reached up to the ceiling fan that’s the soul source of light in my bedroom to turn it off. I distinctly remember doing so, because I took note of my dog sleeping in her bed. I was a bit more tired than usual and figured it would be much easier to get a quality sleep.

As I lay there with my eyes barely open, the light that’s a part of the ceiling fan fixture came back on. It took me a while to figure out what it was, but I hadn’t touched it in any way and had almost gotten to sleep when it happened. Now I’m not one to believe in ghosts or spirits, but for the life of me, I can’t figure out how it turned itself back on. I thought about it for a good while and finally got to sleep. But still this morning, I’m left wondering what it was that caused the light to suddenly come back on. It takes a deliberate tug on the chain to get it to turn on otherwise. And sometimes it takes a couple of pulls to get it turned on. So I’m still pondering on that one and have an open mind when it comes to figuring that one out.

So there you go…two unusual occurrences in the same day and I’m both in awe and also in wonder of what might happen today.

David Lee

Daily Readings for Wednesday, April 29th

Meditation for the Day

The rule of God’s kingdom is perfect order, perfect harmony, perfect supply, perfect love, perfect honesty, perfect obedience. There is no discord in God’s kingdom, only some things still unconquered in God’s children. The difficulties of life are caused by disharmony in the individual man or woman. People lack power because they lack harmony with God and with each other. They think that God fails because power is not manifested in their lives. God does not fail. People fail because they are out of harmony with Him.

Prayer for the Day

I pray that I may be in harmony with God and with other people. I pray that this harmony will result in strength and success.

From Twenty-Four Hours a Day

Initiating Relationships

Often, we can learn much about ourselves from the people to whom we are attracted.

As we progress through recovery, we learn we can no longer form relationships solely on the basis of attraction. We learn to be patient, to allow ourselves to take into account important facts, and to process information about that person.

What we are striving for in recovery is a healthy attraction to people. We allow ourselves to be attracted to who people are, not to their potential or to what we hope they are.

The more we work through our family of origin issues, the less we will find ourselves needing to work through them with the people we’re attracted to. Finishing our business from the past helps us form new and healthier relationships.

The more we overcome our need to be excessive caretakers, the less we will find ourselves attracted to people who need to be constantly taken care of.

The more we learn to love and respect ourselves, the more we will become attracted to people who will love and respect us and who we can safely love and respect.

This is a slow process. We need to be patient with ourselves. The type of people we find ourselves attracted to does not change overnight. Being attracted to dysfunctional people can linger long and well into recovery. That does not mean we need to allow it to control us. The fact is, we will initiate and maintain relationships with people we need to be with until we learn what it is we need to learn – no matter how long we’ve been recovering.

No matter who we find ourselves relating to, and what we discover happening in the relationship, the issue is still about us, and not about the other person. That is the heart, the hope, and the power of recovery.

We can learn to take care of ourselves during the process of initiating and forming relationships. We can learn to go slowly. We can learn to pay attention. We can allow ourselves to make mistakes, even when we know better.

We can stop blaming our relationships on God and begin to take responsibility for them. We can learn to enjoy the healthy relationships and remove ourselves more quickly from the dysfunctional ones.

We can learn to look for what’s good for us, instead of what’s good for the other person.

God, help me pay attention to my behaviors during the process of initiating relationships. Help me take responsibility for myself and learn what I need to learn. I will trust that the people I want and need will come into my life. I understand that if a relationship is not good for me, I have the right and ability to refuse to enter into it – even though the other person thinks it may be good for him or her. I will be open to the lessons I need to learn about me in relationships, so I am prepared for the best possible relationships with people.

From The Language of Letting Go by Melody Beattie

Back at It….

A friend reminded me this evening that it had been a while since I’d posted anything on this site. I knew it had been at least a couple of days, but didn’t know it had been four days since I’d last posted anything.

No real excuses here, but thinking back I can try to figure out why.

After posting on here during Lent, I established a good habit of sharing on this site each day. And with the virus outbreak, it gave me pause to have a lot of thinking to put into words. But as the days have continued to linger, I’ve found I’ve lost interest in some of the things that I knew to be good for me and hopefully for others as well.

A part of it was the fact that I had gone back to school for the first time in over five weeks to do some checking of work that my students had turned in. It was another surreal experience in all of this, walking into my classroom as if we’d never left. Kids’ books and pencils and jackets and such were left just as they were on March 12 and it was like any minute they’d come walking in the classroom to start another day….but I knew that wasn’t going to happen. And then the very next day, to no big surprise, it was announced that they wouldn’t be coming back at all this school year. I guess that kind of stuck with me longer than it should…but things have a habit of doing that.

Another week of online learning started today and there were several bumps along the way. I did have a video meeting with my homeroom class and it was good to see their smiling faces. I know I’m supposed to be a positive force in their lives, but on this particular day, they were doing much the same for me. I guess knowing that they’d never be in my class again this school year made things a little bit different today than in past video meetings.

So there you go…just a myriad of thoughts running through my head…it’s just past 12:34 am…one of those times I look and see the sequence and am reminded that things are not by chance or coincidence,,,that there is order amidst the chaos. And such is the journey I travel this night….

Until tomorrow,

David Lee

Daily Readings for Tuesday, April 28th

Initiating Relationships

Often, we can learn much about ourselves from the people to whom we are attracted.

As we progress through recovery, we learn we can no longer form relationships solely on the basis of attraction. We learn to be patient, to allow ourselves to take into account important facts, and to process information about that person.

What we are striving for in recovery is a healthy attraction to people. We allow ourselves to be attracted to who people are, not to their potential or to what we hope they are.

The more we work through our family of origin issues, the less we will find ourselves needing to work through them with the people we’re attracted to. Finishing our business from the past helps us form new and healthier relationships.

The more we overcome our need to be excessive caretakers, the less we will find ourselves attracted to people who need to be constantly taken care of.

The more we learn to love and respect ourselves, the more we will become attracted to people who will love and respect us and who we can safely love and respect.

This is a slow process. We need to be patient with ourselves. The type of people we find ourselves attracted to does not change overnight. Being attracted to dysfunctional people can linger long and well into recovery. That does not mean we need to allow it to control us. The fact is, we will initiate and maintain relationships with people we need to be with until we learn what it is we need to learn – no matter how long we’ve been recovering.

No matter who we find ourselves relating to, and what we discover happening in the relationship, the issue is still about us, and not about the other person. That is the heart, the hope, and the power of recovery.

We can learn to take care of ourselves during the process of initiating and forming relationships. We can learn to go slowly. We can learn to pay attention. We can allow ourselves to make mistakes, even when we know better.

We can stop blaming our relationships on God and begin to take responsibility for them. We can learn to enjoy the healthy relationships and remove ourselves more quickly from the dysfunctional ones.

We can learn to look for what’s good for us, instead of what’s good for the other person.

God, help me pay attention to my behaviors during the process of initiating relationships. Help me take responsibility for myself and learn what I need to learn. I will trust that the people I want and need will come into my life. I understand that if a relationship is not good for me, I have the right and ability to refuse to enter into it – even though the other person thinks it may be good for him or her. I will be open to the lessons I need to learn about me in relationships, so I am prepared for the best possible relationships with people.

———————————————————

Meditation for the Day

The rule of God’s kingdom is perfect order, perfect harmony, perfect supply, perfect love, perfect honesty, perfect obedience. There is no discord in God’s kingdom, only some things still unconquered in God’s children. The difficulties of life are caused by disharmony in the individual man or woman. People lack power because they lack harmony with God and with each other. They think that God fails because power is not manifested in their lives. God does not fail. People fail because they are out of harmony with Him.

Prayer for the Day

I pray that I may be in harmony with God and with other people. I pray that this harmony will result in strength and success.

Daily Readings for Monday, April 27th

Meditation for the Day

We know God by spiritual vision. We feel that He is beside us. We feel His presence. Contact with God is not made by the senses. Spirit consciousness replaces sight. Since we cannot see God, we have to perceive Him by spiritual perception. God has to span the physical and the spiritual with the gift to us of spiritual vision. Many persons, though they cannot see God, have had a clear spiritual consciousness of Him. We are inside a box of space and time, but we know there must be something outside of that box, limitless space, eternity of time, and God.

Prayer for the Day

I pray that I may have a consciousness of God’s presence. I pray that God will give me spiritual vision.

From Twenty-Four Hours a Day

Letting Go of the Need to Control

The rewards from detachment are great: serenity; a deep sense of peace; the ability to give and receive love in self-enhancing, energizing ways, and the freedom to find real solutions to our problems.

—Codependent No More

Letting go of our need to control can set others and us free. It can set our Higher Power free to send the best to us.

If we weren’t trying to control someone or something, what would we be doing differently?

What would we do that we’re not letting ourselves do now? Where would we go? What would we say?

What decisions would we make?

What would we ask for? What boundaries would be set? When would we say no or yes?

If we weren’t trying to control whether a person liked us or his or her reaction to us, what would we do differently? If we weren’t trying to control the course of a relationship, what would we do differently? If we weren’t trying to control another person’s behavior, how would we think, feel, speak, and behave differently than we do now?

What haven’t we been letting ourselves do while hoping that self-denial would influence a particular situation or person? Are there some things we’ve been doing that we’d stop?

How would we treat ourselves differently?

Would we let ourselves enjoy life more and feel better right now? Would we stop feeling so bad? Would we treat ourselves better?

If we weren’t trying to control, what would we do differently? Make a list, and then do it.

Today, I will ask myself what I would be doing differently if I weren’t trying to control. When I hear the answer, I will do it. God, help me let go of my need to control. Help me set others and myself free.

From The Language of Letting Go by Melody Beattie

Daily Readings for Thursday, April 23rd

Meditation for the Day

Cooperation with God is the great necessity for our lives. All else follows naturally. Cooperation with God is the result of our consciousness of His presence. Guidance is bound to come to us as we live more and more with God, as our consciousness becomes more and more attuned to the great Consciousness of the universe. We must have many quiet times when we not so much ask to be shown and led by God, as to feel and realize His presence. New spiritual growth comes naturally from cooperation with God.

Prayer for the Day

I pray that God may supply me with strength and show me the direction in which He wants me to grow. I pray that these things may come naturally from my cooperation with Him.

From Twenty-Four Hours a Day

Opening Ourselves to Love

Allowing ourselves to receive love is one of the greatest challenges we face in recovery.

Many of us have blocked ourselves from receiving love. We may have lived with people who used love to control us. They would be there for us, but at the high price of our freedom. Love was given, or withheld, to control us and have power over us. It was not safe for us to receive love from these people. We may have gotten accustomed to not receiving love, not acknowledging our need for love, because we lived with people who had no real love to give.

At some point in recovery, we acknowledge that we, too, want and need to be loved. We may feel awkward with this need. Where do we go with it? What do we do? Who can give us love? How can we determine who is safe and who isn’t? How can we let others care for us without feeling trapped, abused, frightened, and unable to care for ourselves?

We will learn. The starting point is surrendering to our desire to be loved, our need to be nurtured and loved. We will grow confident in our ability to take care of ourselves with people. We will feel safe enough to let people care for us; we will grow to trust our ability to choose people who are safe and who can give us love.

We may need to get angry first – angry that our needs have not been met. Later, we can become grateful to those people who have shown us what we don’t want, the ones who have assisted us in the process of believing we deserve love, and the ones who come into our life to love us.

We are opening up like flowers. Sometimes it hurts as the petals push open. Be glad. Our heart is opening up to the love that is and will continue to be there for us.

Surrender to the love that is there for us, to the love that people, the Universe, and our Higher Power send our way.

Surrender to love, without allowing people to control us or keep us from caring for ourselves. Start by surrendering to love for yourself.

Today, I will open myself to the love that is here for me. I will let myself receive love that is safe, knowing I can take care of myself with people. I will be grateful to all the people from my past who have assisted me in my process of opening up to love. I claim, accept, and am grateful for the love that is coming to me.

From The Language of Letting Go by Melody Beattie

Daily Readings for Wednesday, April 22nd

Meditation for the Day

Divine control and unquestioning obedience to God are the only conditions necessary for a spiritual life. Divine control means absolute faith and trust in God, a belief that God is the Divine Principle in the universe and that He is the Intelligence and the Love that controls the universe. Unquestioning obedience to God means living each day the way you believe God wants you to live, constantly seeking the guidance of God in every situation and being willing to do the right thing at all times.

Prayer for the Day

I pray that I may always be under Divine Control and always practice unquestioning obedience to God. I pray that I may be always ready to serve Him. From Twenty-Four Hours a Day

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Coping With Stress

Inevitably, there are times of stress in our lives, no matter how long we’ve been in recovery.

Sometimes, the stress is outside or around us. We’re feeling balanced, but our circumstances are stressful. Sometimes, the stress is within; we feel out of balance.

When the stress is external and internal, we experience our most difficult times.

During stressful times, we can rely more heavily on our support systems. Our friends and groups can help us feel more balanced and peaceful in spite of our stressful conditions.

Affirming that the events taking place are a temporarily uncomfortable part of a good, solid plan can help. We can assure ourselves that we will get through. We won’t be destroyed. We won’t crumple or go under.

It helps to go back to the basics to focus on detachment, dealing with feelings, and taking life one day at a time.

Our most important focus during times of stress is taking care of ourselves. We are better able to cope with the most irregular circumstances; we are better able to be there for others, if we’re caring for ourselves. We can ask ourselves regularly: What do we need to do to take care of ourselves? What might help us feel better or more comfortable?

Self-care may not come as easily during times of stress. Self-neglect may feel more comfortable. But taking care of us always works.

Today, I will remember that there is no situation that can’t be benefited by taking care of myself.

From The Language of Letting Go by Melody Beattie