Happy Thursday everyone!
I hope everything is going well for you.
My week is still stressful but continuing to improve so I am not
complaining. I haven’t been able to do
my morning reading or practice meditation the way that I would like, but in the
overall scheme of life that isn’t much to complain about now is it?
My Wednesday was spent again at Hopkins, but I am sure you
figured that out from some of my comments in the last post. I am trying to remind myself that this
situation is temporary but even I need a little cheering up periodically.
Thankfully I have figured out how to do that myself through reflection. I find it very helpful to remind myself of
everything that is going well. Like I
said some days are easier than others but at least I know all that is happening
will pass and that makes it much easier to handle.
Enough about me, let’s get back to the topic of the month,
improving our health one day at a time. Here
is the recap of what we have accomplished so far to remind us all of how far we
have come during the first 11 days of January:
Day 1 – Defined Success and What is/was Holding Us Back
Day 2 – Determined our Purpose and Looked at Passion
Day 3 – Listed Our Goals for January
Day 4 – Listed the Things We Have Needed to Work on for a
While
Day 5 – Looked at Optimism vs. Pessimism and Fear vs.
Intuition
Day 6 – Practiced Conscious Eating
Day 7 – Hara Hachi Bu
Day 8 – Taking the Stress Out of Meal Time
Day 9 – Acknowledgments
Day 10 – No Excuses, Do it Anyway
Day 11 – Is it True?
Yesterday we talked about “Is it True” which is one of my
favorite exercises. I got so much out of
that one the first time I started asking myself that question. If you get half as much out of it as I did
then I know there will be some huge break throughs for people. I was very surprised by how many “stories” I
used to tell myself in the past. If you
had any revelations when you did this exercise I would love for you to share
them either by commenting or by email.
Have You Really Connected With Someone Today?:
Many of us go through our days on autopilot. We routinely
cross items off our to-do list but we don’t take the time to talk with and
connect to other people. Sure we talk to them but we don’t really listen and
connect. Does that sound like something that happens in your life?
I have a good friend who apparently loves to hear the sound
of her own voice. You know that the entire time you are talking she is
formulating her response, not intently listening to you and is waiting for you
to stop talking so that she can tell you what she thinks. I recognize this behavior because I used to
do the same thing. However in the last
few years I have consciously slowed down focused on what people were saying to
me and it has resulted in big changes in my life. I feel like I know my friends and family much
more deeply than I have in the past.
There are probably some of you who are reading this saying
“That sounds great but how do I do it?”
I understand because this would have been my reaction not that long
ago. I can tell you what I do, and the
same things should work for you.
When you are having a conversation with someone don’t try to
multitask just listen to what the other person is saying. If you find yourself formulating your
response stop and refocus on the other person.
Listen carefully and try to feel the emotion behind their words. This
will be difficult at first but it will get much easier over time. Look at the other person when they are
talking and focus on their face, I like to look people in the eye but not
everyone is comfortable with that so the forehead or chin will work fine too. Does the person you are speaking with need
comforting? Do they simply want to tell their story? Is there anything that you can do for
them? These things will come up for you
naturally as you listen, just go with what feels right.
This won’t work for you all the time. There will be times when you are distracted
and you can’t focus on the other person. Distraction still happens for me too
and when it does I apologize and say that my mind wandered and ask the other
person to repeat themselves. Anytime
this has happened to me the other person has understood, probably because the
same thing happens for them. We live in
such a fast-paced world it is very easy to get distracted.
Why should we do this, what is the benefit? Everyone needs to feel heard. When people are telling you their story they
are trying to reach out and connect. However if we are too busy to hear them we
miss an opportunity to connect to someone else.
Humans need relationships, we are social creatures. What connects us is a need to feel like we
are part of a larger group. No one wants
to be alone or feel like an outsider. By really listening to another person you
enhance your circle of friends and open yourself up to additional
experiences.
Did you know that people with more social connections live
longer, happier and healthier lives?
Crazy right? If having more
friends, connecting to more people means you will live longer than sign me up!
What the heck do we have to lose by trying?
Today’s exercises are:
1.
Choose at least one conversation today and be
100% present. Listen carefully to what
the other person is trying to tell you.
Be there completely there when you are listening to the other person
talk. Try to put yourself in their
situation and be there like you would want someone to be for you.
2.
Wait until the person has finished talking before
you respond. Do NOT interrupt unless something is on fire. Interrupting is a
sign that you aren’t not listening.
3.
Ask yourself how was this conversation different
from the ones that you usually have with this person?
a.
Did you feel more connected?
b.
Maybe they shared more with you because they
knew you were listening.
c.
Do you feel closer to this person or do you like
them more?
d.
Did this conversation strengthen your
relationship?
Progress on my goals:
1.
Newsletters – No progress on this goal on
Wednesday because of my unexpected time at Hopkins. Life seems to be getting in the way of
progress. *ugh*
2.
Body Bugg – Ten days in a row wearing my bugg
and going strong. I think this has become a habit again. ;-) It
will be nice to get home so that I can get back to exercising and give the bugg
something to measure.
3.
Date with Dan – We will be getting back to this
very soon once the crisis is over. For now we are spending lots of time
together I just wouldn’t call it a date.
4.
Measuring
calorie dense food – Given where I was on Wednesday this didn’t actually come
into play. However I now have some trail mix with me to make certain that I
have access to nuts and seeds throughout the day.
5.
Working on my business – I put two hours in to
listening to webinars yesterday for ideas.
I did the same thing on Tuesday but wasn’t sure that it counted. However
I think it does so I included it here.
How are you doing making progress on your goals? I hope you are doing better than I am. I have decided that I am going to work on the
newsletters today in spite of where I am.
That goal has been languishing and I will devote some time to it today.
Acknowledgements:
I asked you to continue to write daily acknowledgements so
that you develop the habit. In order to remind you to write your
acknowledgements I am going to share a few of mine each day for the remainder
of the month. On a “normal” day I write
acknowledgements soon after the activity, before they fall out of my head. But
I wasn’t focused on that yesterday so my list is much shorter than usual.
·
Even though I was out of the house all day again
I did manage to eat a healthy diet. I
had another veggie sub, fresh fruit, nuts and seeds, roasted seaweed, dried
fruit and a salad. Not bad considering
my options. It felt good to be happy
with my decisions.
·
Without any intentional exercise I managed to
get over 15,000 steps today and that is pretty remarkable I think. Not too shabby considering that I have the
read the average American does less than 6,000 steps per day. Do you know how
many you do? “The experts” say we should
all be covering at least 10,000 steps per day to maintain good health.
·
It was another late night for me but I took time
to enjoy the fur children and give them some much needed attention before
bed. I know some people think they are “just
cats” but Dan and I both adore the fur children and consider them family
members. It is important to us that they are taken care of physically and
emotionally. It was nice to spend a
little quality time with my little ones before going to sleep.
·
Once the fur children were taken care of I had a
little me time. I had a nice soak in a hot bath while enjoying a mug of hot
green and white tea with grapefruit and cinnamon. It is interesting how something so simple can
make such a big difference in how I feel. I am glad that I took time to pamper
me today.
·
I made time today to listen to two
webinars. I am listening to a lot of
these lately to get a feel for how other people conduct them, how much content
they share in a hour, what software they use, that sort of thing. It was good to spend a little time on the
business today. I needed to get back to
that.
·
I made a little time to meditation in the
hospital today. Dan was taken for an MRI so I had the room to myself and used
that time to clear my mind and focus on my breathing and do a body scan. If anyone looked in I am sure they were
confused by me in the Lotus position in a chair. Good thing I don’t care much
what others think huh? ;-) It felt good to take a little time to do
something for myself.
Did you write your acknowledgements today? I hope so!
Please take the time to appreciate the good things that you do every day. Even with all the chaos that is swirling for
me now I find that taking a few minutes to write my acknowledgements helps me
to reevaluate my day.
Random Observations:
The entire week has been rather surreal for me. I am used to thinking about cancer but this
week has been different since it was an entirely new issue. It is a bit odd how
I can handle cancer so much more easily but I suppose that is because I have
had many years to research, accept and make peace with cancer.
I have tried to remind myself than none us are given more
than we can handle although that doesn’t work for me 100% of the time. I have
had a minor pity party for myself saying that it is someone else’s turn to deal
with “this shit”. However I also know that everything will be fine and we get
through this like we have gotten through everything else in life, one step at a
time. Feeling sorry for myself never
made anything any better. I bet the same is true for you.
One of the benefits of this situation is now I have an
entirely new health topic to come up to speed on. The universe must be thinking
that I need to broaden my understanding of health beyond cancer. However, the universe could have picked a
more subtle way to get that idea across.
;-) I am up for the challenge and
I will dig into this like I do everything else.
If there is one thing you probably have figured out about me by now that
is that I am tenacious. My husband’s
little brother (a former marine) always says if I was man I would definitely
have made a great marine. He swears I am more gung ho than a lot of marines he
knew. I can’t say I know exactly what he means, but I think it is
compliment. I hope it gives you a little
more insight into how I operate.
The biggest thing that I have learned about myself over the
last 7 or so years is that I am much stronger than I ever realized. Situations that would have knocked me to my
knees years ago and now little more than a bump in the road which is still
amazing to me. I have no idea how any of
this happened. I wish I could explain
how it occurred so that you could call on those “super powers” if you needed
them. I think it comes down to staying calm, doing your research and committing
to doing whatever is necessary.
It is difficult for me when I came to grips with the idea that
all of us are going to die, it is only a matter of when and how. When I was young
death was not something that I ever thought about. Why would you contemplate
death when everyone you know is doing well, and those who get sick bounce back quickly?
We all feel immortal when we are young, at least I did. However once I was in my thirties friends
started to die. I still remember one
horrible year when 3 of my friend died of cancer. The youngest one was 38 and
the oldest was 51. I suppose this is why
I was so determined to do whatever we could to fight back. One thing I know for sure is that if you want
radical changes in your health you have to be willing to make radical changes
in your lifestyle. If you make small
changes you will get small results. As I
wrote the other day, none of us escape the laws of cause and effect.
Wednesday:
It was just another day at the hospital. It was odd to me how quickly I feel back in
to being comfortable in this environment. I have been a bad girl and don’t stop
at security to check in. Apparently I
have that “I am supposed to be here” attitude since no one stops me. I remember years ago when Dan used to show up
at the hospital in the evening to drag me out of work. He also never stopped at security to check in
and frequently they would say “good evening Doctor” when he walked by. I think
it was all in the attitude and the business suit. However I am not really sure why I am getting
away with it in jeans and a sweater. Whatever works right?
We had hoped that Dan would be discharged late Wednesday, as
this was a possibility, but it didn’t happen. The doctors are not quite
finished with him yet. Each time one of
the doctors comes into to check on him we are hearing the same thing,
everything is progressing perfectly you will be out of here soon. Okay,
so when is soon exactly? As much as we
like everyone at Hopkins we are ready to make a break for it. ;-)
Overall the day was uneventful, just more poking, prodding
and testing. Same stuff different day.
For anyone who has been in a hospital you know the drill. We will both be happy to return to normal
life. Dan is threatening to make a break for it, but I know he is kidding about
that. He would never leave AMA (against medical advice). At least he has his sense of humor intact.
Happy thoughts:
Even though I m spending my days at Hopkins there is still
much to be grateful for in life. Here are my happy thoughts today:
·
Life is slowly returning to normal. I am looking forward to having Dan home so
that he can finally get some rest. I am
sure he is tired from not getting much rest over the last few days.
·
The rain we had all day on Wednesday has moved
through and it is sunny and we are expecting temperatures in the upper 50s or
low 60s today. Sweet! Now we just need
Dan to get released so that we can enjoy the weather together.
·
I was very happy to have gotten a spot in the
Weinberg garage yesterday. Leaving the
hospital after 10pm it was comforting knowing that I was in the underground
garage.
·
I had another nice conversation with the
hospital dietitian. He printed out a few articles for me on nut consumption
which I found quite interesting. I picked up a few tid bits of information that
I will share with you soon (once Jan is over).
·
I appreciate everyone’s concern for Dan, thank
you for your well wishes here and by email. Dan didn’t want me to mention
anything about this but I had to say something to explain why I wasn’t getting
things done and you weren’t seeing my meals. Sorry for not giving you more
information but I need to respect Dan’s wishes on this one. If/when he changes his mind I will let you
know what happened. I can tell you that
it is not related to cancer and all the clinicians here are on board with our
diet which still shocks me. I am
starting to believe that there is real change happening in allopathic
medicine. Love that!
·
It is also nice that we have added 14 new
followers in 12 days. I wasn’t certain
how people would react to my more “holistic” approach to better health. However I am very happy to see that it is
being well received. If you have any
questions or topics that you would like me to address please let me know.
Signing Out:
*Whew* What a week
this has been! When Monday started I didn’t anticipate anything that has
happened this week. I suppose this is a
good reminder that life is a series of events both planned and unplanned. Dealing with the planned things is easy.
However the unexpected events tend to cause more upheaval. I believe that taking up meditation has been
the biggest reason that I have been able to go with the flow this week. If you have a particularly stressful life I
would highly recommend meditation. It was tough for me to do at first but it
did get much easier by the end of the first week. Right now I can’t imagine dealing with all of
this without the calming influence of meditation in my life. I hope everything is going well in your
life.
Do you have any fun plans for the weekend? After my week I can’t wait for the
weekend. We both need some fun as well
as some peace and quiet. There is an
interesting artist playing at Blues Alley in DC Thursday and Friday night this
week. He is a saxophone player and combines jazz with Indian music. Doesn’t
that sound interesting? If it were for
the hospital trip we would be there. Now
I may have to buy his new album just to check it out. I love jazz and I love Indian music so I think
I will enjoy it.
Talk with you again soon.
I have no idea how my day will be tomorrow but I plan to get started on the
next post as soon as I have this one up. Hopefully that means I won’t miss a
day. *fingers crossed* Enjoy your evening. J
In case anyone needs a giggle I wanted to recycle the picture of this crazy car I saw this past year in Frederick. Wouldn't you love to know who drives this? I can't look at this without smiling. Someone has a great sense of humor.
I can't believe that you have pushed to get your posts up with everything going on and I have been "too tired" to get with the program. I wanted to take part of your 31 days but as soon as jan 2nd hit...so did work and life and I used that an excuse. I just wasn't focusing on the right thing. Thank you for being a constant inspiration! I will try to catch up on all of your great posts. We are successfully on day 12 of our January vegan challenge and my work-friend is doing well transitioning over to vegan as well.
ReplyDeleteI was able to skim some of your 31 Days posts and read about gathering your healthy recipes. Great idea for us trying to figure out what to eat lately so I spent an hour printing and gathering my latest faves (some from you :) ) Because of that-next week will be an easier menu planning challenge.
Sending healing thoughts towards you and Dan and hope things get closer to normal soon!