Acceptance...

It's Monday, I'm exhausted from our weekend, yet I'm in an awesome mood. I'm looking forward to the week ahead and am actually psyched about it. While we did have a great weekend filled with soccer and friends, I also learned alot about myself in just one instance yesterday.

Our ceiling fan in our bedroom is only about 5-6 months old, but we've been having trouble with the light switch recently. Saturday night the light would not turn off so I ended up sleeping in Tristan's room in his top bunk (I cannot sleep with lights on and Sean was passed out in bed snoring). So yesterday Sean decides to try and fix it. (Keep in mind he is NOT an electrician AND when he first hooked the big, heavy fan up to the ceiling he had help from our neighbor.) Long story short, my fan is now in a million pieces because it was too heavy for him to do this on his own and it fell (nearly hitting me by less then a foot). But my reaction to the whole thing is what surprised me. Normally, this kind of stuff happens all the time with Sean and I get so annoyed. He is a bull in a china shop - an accident waiting to happen whether he trips over his own two feet or breaks things (he just broke Kieran's Nintendo DS game holder for instance).

To my surprise I didn't get that annoying feeling, the blood didn't rush to my head and I did not blame or scream at him. I walked out of the room, got Tristan and his things and left for the soccer fields. And that was that.

Acceptance is something I've been working very hard on this past year. And it's paying off. I honestly feel that if you can accept anything - you're better off. You make yourself miserable when you don't accept - when you fight things. Whether it's accepting you have to do something you really don't want to do, or accepting people for who they are - whatever your situation - if you just "accept", you're fine. (This is all stuff I've learned by reading many books: Way of the Peaceful Warrior by Dan Millman and A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle are some of those books.) I've been doing that with soccer as well. Those who know me know it's been a very trying year soccer wise. I'm learning to accept the fact that you cannot make everyone happy and that some just like to bitch and moan - that's their character. I refuse to let myself get wrapped up in it again and I'm just accepting some people are unhappy. And it seems nothing short of a miracle will make them happy either so I'll let them sit in their own delusions and unhappiness without bringing me down with them. I'm accepting that I cannot fix everything and cannot make everyone happy.

Acceptance is part of the key to joy fullness and happiness. Try to make acceptance a part of your everyday life and I promise you, you WILL notice a difference.

-Kim

The Power of Now!

Last week while waiting for Sean to get out of surgery I finished up the book A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle and it was perfect timing. It made me feel so relaxed and has given me new ways to deal with life, people and situations in general. I felt rejuvenated after reading that and like a new person with a new outlook on life. I felt like I found another part of "home" just like I did when I went to my church for the first time last year and just like I did after reading my other favorite book Ishmael by Daniel Quinn or also like I did after watching The Secret.

I eventually am going to reread this book and will go over it chapter by chapter right here on this blog. But that will have to wait because while reading A New Earth, it kept referencing another book he'd written before this one called The Power of Now. I just got this one in the mail today and I am so excited to get started reading it.

I recommend any of these books to everyone! But, you have to be in a certain place in your life; you have to be ready for them. If, while starting to read any of them you can't get into the
book(s) or think "this is all fluff and stuff" or anything along those lines, you're not ready. It doesn't mean you never will be, just that you're not at the place you need to be at this time of your life to begin this new "state of consciousness" where we leave our egos behind.

-Kim