You
are reading from the book Today's Gift.
For nothing can be sole or whole that has not been rent. --W. B. Yeats
The maple out front is young and healthy, but it grows in the shape of
a Y. Neighborhood tree experts have warned that as it grows, it will
split in half as the weight of the two main branches pull down against
each other. One of these two beautiful branches, already lush with new
leaves, must be cut. But once pruned, the remaining branch will
straighten as it reaches for the sun. It will grow faster, and the
whole tree will live many years longer--all by cutting it back today.
Sometimes we are like this tree. We go in too many directions, and
can't seem to do any one thing well. When this happens, we need to give
something up, to choose which direction we want and stick with it. The
results will be well worth the price.
What is holding me back from growth?
You are reading from the book Touchstones.
Truth is a demure lady, much too ladylike to knock you on the head and
drag you to her cave. She is there, but the people must want her and
seek her out. --William F.Buckley, Jr.
As we develop a deeper and more reliable friendship with ourselves, we
have little hunches or inner blips of feeling that tell us private
truths. Ancient scriptures called it "a still, small voice." We usually
sense this inner message somewhere in our body. Some men say it's in
the heart, others say in the gut, or ear, or on their shoulders. When
we are too focused on what others think and feel and what the world
says is truth, we don't notice our inner voice; it doesn't get much
chance to develop. It never hits us over the head; it requires silence
and respect to be heard.
As we follow the Steps, we learn to regularly visit the cave of this
demure lady, Truth, and seek out her wisdom. The more we listen and the
more we respect the truths we receive in our quietness, the more wisdom
we are given.
I will listen to the personal wisdom whispered by that still, small
voice within.
You are reading from the book Each Day a New Beginning.
It only takes one person to change your life--you. --Ruth Casey
Change is not easy, but it's absolutely unavoidable. Doors will close.
Barriers will surface. Frustrations will mount. Nothing stays the same
forever, and it's such folly to wish otherwise. Growth accompanies
positive change; determining to risk the outcome resulting from a
changed behavior or attitude will enhance our self-perceptions. We will
have moved forward; in every instance our lives will be influenced by
making a change that only each of us can make.
We have all dreaded the changes we knew we had to make. Perhaps even
now we fear some impending changes. Where might they take us? It's
difficult accepting that the outcome is not ours to control. Only the
effort is ours. The solace is that positive changes, which we know are
right for us and other people in our lives, are never going to take us
astray. In fact, they are necessary for the smooth path just beyond
this stumbling block.
When we are troubled by circumstances in our lives, a change is called
for, a change that we must initiate. When we reflect on our recent as
well as distant past, we will remember that the changes we most dreaded
again and again have positively influenced our lives in untold ways.
Change ushers in glad, not bad, tidings.
You are reading from the book The Language of Letting Go.
Sadness
Ultimately, to grieve our losses means to surrender to our feelings.
So many of us have lost so much, have said so many good byes; have been
through so many changes. We may want to hold back the tides of change,
not because the change isn't good, but because we have had so much
change, so much loss.
Sometimes, when we are in the midst of pain and grief, we become
shortsighted, like members of a tribe described in the movie Out of
Africa.
If you put them in prison, one character said, describing this tribe,
they die.
Why? asked another character.
Because they cant grasp the idea that they'll be let out one day. They
think its permanent, so they die.
Many of us have so much grief to get through. Sometimes we begin to
believe grief, or pain, is a permanent condition.
The pain will stop. Once felt and released, our feelings will bring us
to a better place than where we started. Feeling our feelings, instead
of denying or minimizing them, is how we heal from our past and move
forward into a better future. Feeling our feelings is how we let go.
It may hurt for a moment, but peace and acceptance are on the other
side. So is a new beginning.
God, help me fully embrace and finish my endings, so I may be ready for
my new beginnings.
Today I will look at all my fears in a new light. I can now see them as
a result of my thinking and will turn over all my fear thoughts to my
Higher Power. Fear no longer owns me or is a threat to my day. --Ruth
Fishel