I know its been a while, sometimes I just don’t have the strength or the energy to blog, especially when my frame of mind isn’t so good.  I hate to rant all the time, or just sound gosh darn negative.  I went to a class on Saturday with a friend, it was a workshop on “finding inner peace”.

I thought to myself, “hey, that’s just what  I need, seeing as how in the last 8 and a half months, I have been stressed beyond imagination, to the tune of daily anxiety attacks as my world began to collapse around me and on top of me.

So as I found my self rolling at top speed down the mountain again, taking out every bush, rock and tree on the way.  Landing at the bottom, bruised, bleeding and thinking, “Ouch, dam that really hurt”.  And in the effort to stop the out of control spiral I felt I was caught in, I thought , go and see what the possibility of inner peace might bring.

It can’t get any worse, so off I went, coffee in hand, not knowing what to expect, eager to hear what was going to be taught.  Boy, was I unprepared for what I was going to hear.

You would have thought the class had been written just for me.  Every single thing the teacher described about stress, what it does to us, what we do to create it, and let it control us, was me to a tee.  I could have raised my hand, and said, ‘yep, that’s me, yep, me again”.

I thought some of what was taught was well worth repeating.  First of all, stress makes our mind go crazy, its like an out of control elephant in the room.  We have to find a way, to quiet, and calm our minds. Because regardless of what other people say, stress will inevitably make us sick and miserable.

That really hit home with me, because I have been miserable.  Noticeable to some, not so noticeable to others.  I hide my pain very well, I have that move honed down to an art form.

We can’t change everything that is going on around us, but we can change what we let our minds do with whats going on around us.  The teacher said most of the time we go to “worst case scenario”.  BINGO!!!! I am SO GUILTY of that, all the time.

And I have created this compact world,  that I have been  living in, since our crisis started 9 months ago.  When in fact things really are not as bad as my mind, has let them become.  Another example used was, how stress affects us physically, how it can make us sick.  When we find a lump, or that finger is twitching, what do we do?  We GOOGLE it!!!

And there before our eyes, a list of possible diagnosis comes up, and before we know it, we are convinced, “we are going to die now.”  DING DING DING!!! me again!!  After a while it was quite humorous to sit and listen to myself being described to a tee.

Sometimes we think that if we go on vacation, to some far away place, that this will help us with our stress.  But imagine yourself lying on that tropical beach, and suddenly you begin to think, “is the neighbor feeding the cat?, will the cat be dead when I get home.” or I made coffee before I left for the airport.  ”did I turn the  coffee maker off.”

Your smiling right now, because we have all been there.  The lesson from that is, even though you go on vacation, you take your mind with you!!! You don’t leave it at home.  Or how about the “mountain out of a mole hill syndrome.”  Yep, you guessed it, strike three, me again.

Although part of that is because I am nurse,  I know my readers who are nurses can relate, we are the worst patients, and the worst offenders of self-diagnosis.

So whats the point of all of this?  The point is, that sometimes we really need to get a different perspective on whats going on. Stand back from the mountain, and see that it really is small, just  like a molehill.

I know that some of you can relate to all of this, I know that I am not the only one who has gone through this. I just wanted to share, hoping that if it helps me, maybe it can help you too.

Don’t get so stressed over the laundry, its laundry.  Its not like you have to sling your clothes over your shoulder and walk 10 miles to the river and pound your clothes on the rocks to clean them, and then walk back.

You open the lid, you put the soap in, you press the button! She reminded us that there are people who cant even do laundry, because they have no home.  They have no food, no money, they have nothing.

It really did once again remind me, that we have to appreciate the things that we do have.  To stop and find the joy, in whats around us.

So take a few minutes everyday to sit and delight in the silence, focus on one single thing, your breathing, floating on a cloud, prayer, whatever helps you to clear your mind.

and be thankful for what you have in life, all of it, from the washing machine, to the kids… Delight in Gods blessings, and don’t allow the stress to control you…

food for thought, until we talk again…..